


Have Your Cake (And Eat It Too)

by LooseScrewsLefty, takethembystorm



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Identity Issues, Identity Reveal, Secret Identity, collab fic, gratuitous amounts of baked goods, there is angst now, this all started with a shitpost on tumblr and snowballed into Marichat hell REALLY FAST
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-22
Updated: 2017-01-13
Packaged: 2018-07-26 01:46:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 46,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7555354
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LooseScrewsLefty/pseuds/LooseScrewsLefty, https://archiveofourown.org/users/takethembystorm/pseuds/takethembystorm
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Inspired by larvesta's post on tumblr- "Marichat fanfic but chat goes through the front door"</p><p>Of all things Marinette expected to find when she answered the knocking on the bakery’s front door at four in the morning, her superhero partner was pretty low on the list.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In Which Chat Demonstrates Himself Incapable of Feeding Himself

Of all things Marinette expected to find when she answered the knocking on the bakery’s front door at four in the morning, her superhero partner was pretty low on the list.

After all, it wasn’t as though Chat had ever visited her or the bakery for non-akuma related reasons before. Running around too much in costume was a risk that could expose their identities to Hawkmoth’s evil eyes if they weren’t careful, so they had an unspoken agreement to only use their powers when necessary, to minimize the risks.

Hence why Marinette was very, VERY confused as to why a sheepishly grinning superhero was waving awkwardly at her on the doorstep.

At four in the morning.

On a SATURDAY.

…Exactly how many ways were there to skin a cat, anyways?

Something in that last thought must have shown on Marinette’s face, because Chat visibly winced and took a nervous step back to distance himself from the girl (and there was something a little satisfying in knowing that she could scare a boy who was wearing impenetrable magic armor) before dragging his claws through his wild blond hair in an anxious gesture.

“I a-paw-logize if I disturbed your beauty sleep, Princess, unnecessary though it may be.” Chat said as he flashed her a grin and a wink. Marinette’s glare hardened.

“You have two minutes to tell me why you’re here. Any more puns or pickup lines and I’m calling the animal shelter and telling them I found a stray who needs to be neutered,” she threatened flatly, in no mood to entertain her partner’s games. Her sleep was a rare commodity as it was without him cutting into it with whatever senseless games he was playing.

“Ouch! No need to cut a man so deep there, Princess.” Chat replied. The hand Marinette still had on the door began to pull the barrier shut, which earning her a panicked wince. “Wait! No! Sorry! That was an accident, I swear! I promise I’ll behave! Cat’s honor!” Marinette sighed at her partner’s flustering, but opened the door a little wider.

She tried not to smile as Chat sagged in relief at that. Much.

“Actually, the truth is that I sort of need your help.” He admitted.

“Help with what?” Marinette asked, curiosity beating out her reluctance to interact with her partner more than necessary sans mask. Chat wasn’t stupid by any means, which was the reason she’d put on the ‘vapid fangirl’ act with the Evillustrator thing. She didn’t want him getting any suspicions about Marinette being anything other than a normal girl.

“A gift.” Chat answered, suddenly looking a little embarrassed. “There’s someone important to me, and I wanted to give her something.”

“Her?” Marinette repeated. “So you have a special girl in your life then?”

“More than just special. She’s utterly amazing. The love of my life!” Chat said with an earnest laugh. Marinette tried to ignore the sharp pain that sent right into her heart. She had no right to feel jealous. She’d always known that Chat hadn’t been serious when he flirted with her, as Marinette or as Ladybug. And her heart belonged to Adrien, not her goof of a partner. There was no reason for her to feel betrayed by the fact that Chat was apparently seeing someone and wanted to get them a gift.

Of course, knowing that didn’t stop her from feeling that way anyways.

Mentally stomping on those rebellious emotions and grinding them into dust under her heel, Marinette took a step to the side to open the passageway for Chat, flashing him a small smile at his look of surprise.

“It might be easier to talk about this inside, where your fangirls can’t mob us if they see you.” Marinette said pointedly. The streets were empty in the early morning calm so the chances of anyone spotting them were practically nonexistent, but she still felt the need for some degree of caution. Ladybug and Chat Noir fans could be rather extreme sometimes, as both her best friend AND worse enemy so clearly demonstrated.

Chat beamed at her with a thousand watt smile before eagerly scurrying past the threshold, allowing Marinette to close the door behind him and immediately lock it.

“Um, my parents are out of town right now so it’s just me. Can’t be too careful, right?” Marinette explained when Chat gave her a curious look at the click of the lock.

“And yet you let mysterious masked boys into your home? That doesn’t seem all that careful Princess.” Chat goaded her with a teasing smirk.

“I think I can handle you, kitty.” The quip left her lips before she could stop it, and Marinette cringed at how Ladybug-ish she’d sounded and quickly scrambled to cover her mistake. “Besides! You’re a superhero right? That’s perfectly safe. I mean, you save people so obviously you’re trustworthy, right?”

“That I am Princess. That I am.” Chat said, looking pleased with the praise. Marinette let out a breath of relief as her slip up went unnoticed. Saved by the ego…

“So what’s this about the gift you want to get your special girl, anyways? I mean, why come to me for help?” Marinette asked, eager to get down to business and get the cat out of her house.

“Right!” Chat said, eager smile back in place. “See, I wanted to give her something extra special and have kinda been trying to think of something for a while now.”

“Still not seeing where I come in, but okay.” Marinette said as she crossed her arms.

“I’m getting there! Anyways, she’s kinda got a sweet tooth, so I thought maybe she’d like something like a cake or some cookies or something.”

“So you came to buy some sweets? And you couldn’t do that during business hours? OUT of costume?” Marinette had been impressed by Chat Noir’s brilliance many times in the course of their partnership. This was not one of them.

“Well, not exactly.” Chat Noir said, suddenly looking a little nervous. Marinette’s annoyance melted away into curiosity. “See, I want it to be special, so she knows how much she means to me. And, well, she said once that she thinks homemade gifts are the best, because it shows how much you care about someone when you make something just for them. So I was actually kinda wondering if… well… maybe…” Realization struck Marinette like a bolt from the blue as she watched her partner squirm.

“You want to MAKE her a cake?” She clarified, surprised and oddly warmed at the realization. She knew where Chat’s mystery girl was coming from with the whole ‘handmade gifts’ thing. It was a sentiment she shared as well, though she understood that most people didn’t have the time to make their gifts the way she did. It was sweet and thoughtful that Chat was so enamored with this girl that he’d try and show it in a way that she would understand best.

“Except I kinda don’t know how to bake. Or do anything in the kitchen, really.” Chat admitted, “So I was kinda hoping maybe you could teach me? I really want to make a cake all on my own, but I kinda failed pretty bad when I tried last night and got banned from setting foot in my kitchen ever again. So, maybe you can teach me? You don’t have to if it’s asking too much, but I sort of hoped-!” The rest of Chat’s babbling was drowned out by the laugh that tore from Marinette as the girl shook her head in dismayed amusement.

Unbelievable. Chat wanted to learn how to bake from the ground up just to make this mystery girl happy.

“Whoever your sweetheart is, she’s a lucky girl.” Marinette told him with a smile.

“Yeah, I don’t think anyone would disagree with you on that.” Chat laughed back before grinning at her hopefully. “So you’ll help me then?” She shouldn’t. She knew that she shouldn’t. There was a whole book of reasons not to…

“Sure, why not?”

…But Chat was her partner and she loved the goof and wanted him to be happy. And if mystery girl could put a smile on her dorky cat’s face, then she’d gift wrap the girl in yo-yo string and drop her into Chat’s arms herself if she had to.

“Great!” Chat cheered, grinning happily. “This is gonna be Claw-some!”

“Yeah, yeah, cool the puns and follow me, kitty.” Marinette laughed, beckoning Chat up the stairs to the apartment above the bakery.

“We’re not using the bakery?” Chat asked as he followed.

“That’s Papa’s workspace. I’m sure he wouldn’t mind if I asked, but he’s away right now and I’m not going to mess around down there without permission.” Marinette told her partner firmly. “Don’t worry, the kitchen will have everything we need.” Chat looked thoughtful at that response.

“So when did you start learning to bake, anyways?”

“It’s been a lifelong lesson.” Marinette smiled as she answered. “I used to follow Papa around and try and help all the time when I was little. Looking back, I’m sure I just made a bigger mess of everything and did more harm than good, but Papa was always really patient with me. He’s a really good teacher. It’s too bad that you didn’t come when he was around, since he’d probably help you a lot more then I could.”

“I’m sure you’re an amazing teacher, Marinette.” Chat Noir said quickly. The speed of the response combined with the use of her name made Marinette pause.

“And what makes you so sure, kitty?” She asked, raising an eyebrow. Chat grinned back.

“Just a feeling.” He replied slyly, slipping past Marinette and heading towards her kitchen without any direction from the blue-eyed girl. Marinette’s eyebrows climbed higher as Chat opened the door to their kitchen area and let himself inside, a strange feeling bubbling up in her chest at the realization that Chat has been to her house at some point with enough time to learn his way around.

Clearly, her partner was more mysterious than she thought…


	2. In Which Our Heroine Finds Herself Confused

"You can't," Marinette says with the stilted deliberation of someone whose patience is beginning to resemble a creaking oil lamp seated very closely to the edge of a ledge in high wind with several barrels of gunpowder and bottles of nitroglycerin right beneath it, “melt the butter.”

“All I’m saying is that it’d be a lot faster than this,” Chat complains as his eyes follow the oscillating beaters as they whirr around the bowl.

“It’s been thirty seconds,” Marinette says.  “Melting it would take longer anyways.”

“Uh huh,” Chat says, cocking an eyebrow at her.

“Look, who’s the baker’s daughter who’s more or less been apprenticed to a master baker since she could walk---”

Chat holds up both his hands in surrender.  “All right, all right,” he says.  “Why, though?”

“Works air into the mix,” Marinette says as she pulls out a sack of cake flour and sets it on the counter next to the mixer.  “The sugar helps.”

Chat frowns contemplatively as Marinette grabs a few eggs from the industrial-sized refrigerator and sets them in a bowl next to the flour.

“Hm,” he mumbles as she grabs a can of baking powder and a set of measuring spoons.  “Makes sense, the sugar crystals aren’t going to dissolve too easily in the butter and they’re pretty rough.”

“What are you going on about?” Marinette says as she grabs a spatula and a round cake pan.  She ducks down and rummages for a minute before she emerges with a can of nonstick spray.

“Oh, nothing,” Chat says, running a hand through his hair.  “What are you doing?”

“Do you want the cake to stick to the pan?” she says as she sprays the pan liberally.  “Crack the eggs into the bowl please.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Chat says.

“And none of that cheek.  Where’d Dad put the vanilla, where’s the vanilla.”

“One bowlful of eggs, Princess,” Chat reports.  “Now what?”

“Any shell in it?” Marinette calls back, shoulder-deep in the fridge.

“What do you take me for, Princess?”

“You’re the one who said he was useless in the kitchen,” Marinette says as she emerges from the fridge with an industrial-sized brown bottle.  “Add them to the bowl, one at a time.”

“Why?”

“Just do it, Chat.”

A frustratingly slow hour later and Marinette sits back, wiping the back of her hand across her flour-dusted forehead as Chat scribbles notes across a sheet of her notebook paper.

“Mix at room temperature, eggs, then dry goods, sifting first,” Chat murmurs, his tongue poking out of a corner of his mouth.

Marinette looks at the freshly frosted cake, then at Chat.

She would never, in a million billion quadrillion years have taken Chat to be as, well, as studious as he’d been today.  He’d asked intelligent questions, been attentive---after she’d kicked him in the shins once or twice to keep him from eating the batter---and been quick on the uptake.  She knew that he was a quick thinker, of course, but he’d always struck her more as being the kind of guy that would hock spitballs at the teacher than a model student.

Then again, she’d never considered that he’d be the kind of person for, well, commitment.

Her blood is suddenly a few degrees too warm, the kitchen a sudden inferno as Chat pans his gaze around the kitchen, making note of equipment and ingredients.

“What do you call that pan you used?” he says.  “And the, uh, thingy, the thing you used when you were frosting it.”

“Round cake pan,” Marinette says.  “And are you talking about the turntable or the frosting spatula?”

“Both, thank you,” Chat says, and writes them down.  He stops, staring at the page, and sets the pencil down with a click.

“What is it this time?” Marinette groans, rolling her eyes.

“What if,” Chat begins, then stops, biting his lower lip.  Marinette sits quietly as he works up the nerve to speak again.

“What if she doesn’t like it?” he says, as though merely speaking the words might unleash some terrible monstrosity upon the world, as though the power of the words might bring them into truth.  “What if she’s allergic or something to something in it, what if she just---”

Marinette cuts him off before his rambling train of thought can dream up some horrific accident that ends with half the city aflame.

“Chat,” she says, reaching over to place her hand on one of his, “I think this is one of those times where it’s not so much the gift as who’s giving it.”

“But that’s just it,” Chat whispers.  “What if---”

“Then she’s an idiot,” Marinette says.  “You’re a good person, Chat Noir, and you’ll find the right person for you someday.”

Chat manages a weak chuckle.  “Not to sound condescending,” he says, “but I’m a little more concerned with the immediate consequences, Princess.”

Marinette takes back her hand with a little jerk and shrugs.  “Then you’ll always have a friendly shoulder to cry on.”

Chat snorts quietly and folds the sheet of paper up, tucking it away in one of his pockets.

“I might be taking you up on that offer,” he says.

They lapse into an odd, sucking silence, neither of them looking at the other.

“Well,” Chat says with a forced grin a minute later.  “I won’t intrude upon you any further.”

“Wait,” Marinette says, reaching out again and seizing him by the wrist as he gets up.  “Not yet.”

“Princess?”

“I’m not eating all of this by myself,” she says, walking over and grabbing a knife.  “You take half.”

“No, no, shut up,” Marinette adds a moment later as Chat opens his mouth to protest.  “Take it.  I could hear your stomach rumbling when it was baking.”

Five minutes later, Marinette ushers Chat out the back door, his half of the cake safely tucked away in one of the takeaway boxes from the bakery.  She shuts it behind him with her back, then slides to the floor, hugging her knees to her chest.

“He’s just your partner, he’s just your partner, he’s just your partner,” she mutters to herself as she stares at the opposite wall.


	3. In Which Marinette Pines

It had been two weeks since she’d given impromptu baking lessons to Chat, and she hadn’t seen him since.

Not as Marinette, anyways. Obviously, Ladybug and Chat Noir still met up on a near daily basis to fight akuma or patrol the city, but Ladybug wasn’t supposed to know about Chat and Marinette’s little tryst, and she was a little reluctant to try and push the issue as her alterego. It would be hypocritical of her to keep insisting that they keep personal issues separate from their work relationship and then use Ladybug try and get him to talk about his lady love. Honestly, it still felt like she was being a little hypocritical about butting into Chat’s personal life as Marinette, even though he was the one to come to her for help.

More than anything though, Marinette was frustrated because Chat wasn’t acting any different around Ladybug. He’d still joke and flirt with her despite telling Marinette he was in love with someone else, which was as much a relief as it was irritating. She was glad to know that Chat being in a relationship wasn’t going to affect them as partners, but all the same she couldn’t help but feel a little offended on behalf of Chat’s nameless sweetheart.

She definitely wouldn’t appreciate her boyfriend flirting with other girls if it was her in those shoes, after all.

With that in mind, Ladybug took the initiative to put the brakes on Chat’s playful flirting even more than she already did, trying to ignore the uncomfortable feeling of guilt that ate away from her every time she received a look of surprise hurt for rebuking the cat. She told herself that it was for his own good. If Chat’s girlfriend ever found out about his alter ego, then she’d likely be upset about the way she and Chat teased one another and that would put her partner in hot water. That was the last thing Marinette wanted. 

But honestly she was probably trying to protect her own heart as much as she was protecting her Black Cat’s.

“I’m so stupid…” Marinette mumbled to herself as she halfheartedly pushed a broom around the bakery’s kitchen to clean up the fine dust of flour and sugar on the floor. Their family bakery had closed half an hour ago and she had volunteered to tidy up, hoping that doing something productive would help take her mind off the Chat problems. She’d hit a brick wall with her efforts to design something, more often than not catching herself absentmindedly doodling cat’s eyes in her notebooks rather than outfits, and her homework had been finished earlier which left her hands free.

“You are not. Don’t say that about yourself, Marinette.” Tikki scolded her from where she sat on the counter, munching a leftover cookie.

“Yes I am.” Marinette insisted. “I mean, I feel like I’m reaching out to Chat with one hand, and slapping him away with the other. And it’s not like I can even tell him that the reason I’m pushing him away now is because I don’t want him getting into trouble with his girlfriend, so he probably thinks I’ve lost it or something. It’s not fair to him, Tikki. He doesn’t deserve that.”

“Then talk to him about it.” Tikki advised her charge.

“You know I can’t do that, Tikki.” Marinette sighed, clenching the broom and starting at the floor. “I’m the one who keeps saying that we can’t know these sort of things about each other. And this whole thing just proves I’m right about how it affects our teamwork negatively when we let things get too personal.”

“Only because you let it affect your teamwork negatively.” Tikki chided her softly. “Marinette, you’re a very smart and passionate girl. It’s one of the things that makes you such a wonderful Ladybug. But sometimes you have a tendency to overthink the possibilities and let the ‘what ifs’ control your life, and that’s not healthy. You said yourself that you’d be there for Chat if things went sour with the girl he likes. Why shouldn’t Ladybug be there too? Don’t change who you are or the relationship that you have with Chat because he’s seeing someone else, that’s not fair to anybody. Especially you and Chat.”

“I just don’t want to mess things up for him.” Marinette admitted quietly. “He likes this girl so much Tikki. I don’t want to be the reason that things don’t work out between them.”

“If things don’t work out between them, then it won’t BE because of you, and you should never let yourself think otherwise. Relationships need to have trust in order to work. If this girl doesn’t trust Chat’s love for her enough to accept his friendship with you, then that’s her fault, NOT yours. You can’t let that possibility put a wall between you and your partner.”

Marinette hung her head at the kwami’s lecture. Tikki was right. She knew she was. It was silly of her to insist on distancing herself from Chat for some girl she’d never met. But it was easier to insist that was the reason she wanted to keep Chat at an arm’s length instead of admitting that a bigger reason was due to the fact that she like Chat was abandoning her in favor of this other girl, and how much that idea hurt.

She didn’t want to lose her partner, and yet she was the one pushing him away.

Before she could admit as much to the kwami though, a sharp knock came from the front of the store, signaling a late visitor. Marinette sighed, figuring that it was likely a desperate last minute customer looking for some bread and set her broom to the side, making her way to the front door to open it.

And for the second time, Marinette found herself staring at her partner as he smiled sheepishly from her doorstep with his arms behind his back, doing a very bad job at acting like she wasn’t hiding something from her.

“Chat?” She clarified, a little alarmed at the appearance of the cat she’d just been talking about.

“Hope I’m not intruding this time, Princess.” The cat greeted her. Before she could ask what he was doing visiting so late, the blond brought his hands out from behind his back to present her with a box. Marinette’s eyes widened when she realized that it wasn’t just any box that the cat was holding out to her. It was a cake box, with a little film screen on the top so you could see the dessert inside.

And suddenly, Marinette found it impossible to breathe.

 _It can’t be._  She thought, eyes going wide as she took in the sight before her.  _It CAN’T be._

Chat Noir was presenting her with a cake. Chat Noir, who had asked her to teach him to make a cake for the girl he was in love with.

_So the girl Chat likes is actually-?!_

“I was hoping maybe you’d indulge me in a little taste-test. To see if I got it right this time.” Chat spoke up, looking a little anxious. Marinette stared for a minute, not comprehending the words at first.

“Wh-what?” she asked faintly, eyes darting from the cake to her partner, who looked confused at her reaction.

“Is everything alright?” he asked worriedly. “If this is a bad time or something, I can come back later.” Marinette swallowed hard, her knee-jerk reaction to seeing the cake that was being presented to her ebbing as the facts began to sink in.

Chat wasn’t in love with her. He just wanted his opinion on his baking skills before he made the cake he was going to give to his sweetheart. He was just coming to her because she was his friend and he trusted her.

And she was disappointed about that.

Because she had wanted it to be for her.

Because she liked Chat Noir.

“Princess? Marinette?!”

She LIKED her partner, who was in love with someone else.

“Marinette!” Chat yelped, looking a little alarmed. It suddenly dawned on the girl that she was leaning against her doorway, laughing in a way that probably looked a little crazy to the poor, confused cat on her doorstep.

Control. She had to get control of herself before she embarrassed herself any further.

“Marinette, are you alright?!” Chat asked, looking worried at her face. Dimly, Marinette realized that her cheeks were wet with tears. No wonder Chat freaked out.

“I’m fine.” She managed in a shaky voice, pushing her partner away a little when she realized he had a hold on her shoulder. “just kinda lost it there for a minute. It’s… um… it’s been a long day.” Chat didn’t look completely convinced, but he respectfully took a step back at her prompting, though the frown on his face made it clear he was reluctant to do so.

She liked Chat. She liked her dorky, pun-cracking partner who she once had to save from an army of giant rubber ducks after he’d sassed an akuma into an angry frenzy.

She liked the boy who turned up at her house at four AM because he was in love and wanted to express his feelings through baked goods even though he didn’t know how.

She liked the goofy, big-hearted hero who was her best friend and who drove her crazy with poorly timed jokes, but who always had her back when she needed him the most.

She LIKED Chat.

“Oh! Sorry. I mean, I knew it was late and I probably shouldn’t come by, but I’ve really been practicing and this one looks like it turned out pretty good, so I just wanted to see if I could get the Princess’ opinion. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you, I’ll come back-”

“Stop rambling and come in, silly cat.” Marinette demanded. She didn’t want to be left alone with her thoughts right now. It was too much, and she couldn’t handle that. She’d sort out the whys and hows of her feelings later, after she helped her partner his HIS issues ironed out.

She was better at lending other people a hand then getting her own life under control, anyways.

“Are you sure?” Chat asked worriedly. “If you’re not feeling well, I can come back- AWWWK!” Chat’s protests were cut off in favor of an awkward yelp as Marinette physically dragged him into the house, shutting and locking the door behind him.

“What did I say last time about the fangirls?” Marinette asked him with a pointed look. Chat looked at her in surprise for a moment before a relieved grin stretched across his face.

“If you’re that worried about my fans giving you cat-attude, I can start sneaking in from the roof instead.” The blond volunteered cheerfully.

“Please don’t. My parents will kill me if they find out I’ve been feeding a stray.” It was oddly easy to fall back into bantering with Chat after her earth-shattering epiphany, which was a little surprising. Not that she wanted to turn into a stuttering mess of a person while trying to speak to her partner, but the fact that she didn’t was still a surprise after the disaster she’d made out of her relationship with Adrien.

Maybe it was because it was harder to feel intimidated by someone after you’d caught them singing Disney songs from the top of the Eiffel Tower which launched an hour long debate on whether or not Aristocats could be considered a classic…?

“Guess I’ll just keep using the door then.” Chat grinned playfully, clearly relieved that she had regained some semblance of sanity. “Though technically speaking, this time the stray is feeding you.”

“So you are.” Marinette said, flashing a bittersweet smile to the cake that had sent her into such a tizzy. “Follow me, kitty. Let’s see how you did.”

“Yes ma’am!” Chat chirped happily as he fell in line obediently behind her.

 _What am I supposed to do with this cat?_ Marinette wondered to herself, flashing Tikki a reassuring smile when she caught her peeking out from the bakery with a worried look, though she felt pretty uneasy herself.

She had a feeling that she’d just made everything far more complicated by developing a crush on her partner…


	4. In Which Chat Is Insecure

“Not bad,” Marinette mutters a minute later as she chews her way through a slice.  “Good crumb, a little too much sugar, did you go by volume instead of weight?”

“Uh, yes,” Chat says.  “Why, does that matter?”

“It can,” Marinette says as she takes another forkful.  She chews contemplatively for a minute and swallows.  “Bit tough,” she says.  “Try to work the batter less.  You want to mix it just enough to bring it all together and no more.”

“Damn it,” Chat sighs.  He unclips his baton, slides it open, and taps out a note to himself as Marinette finishes her slice.

“So,” she says as he finishes the note and puts his staff away.  “Two weeks.  Two weeks and you still haven’t approached her.”

Chat snorts and gestures vaguely towards the cake.  “Well, you know why.”

“No, I don’t,” Marinette says, putting down her fork.  “Chat, this is fine, most people wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between this and something you got from the bakery.”

“Well,” she amends a moment later, “let’s be frank, the frosting looks like it’s been slapped on by a drunken chimpanzee on bad acid, but I could help you smooth that out no problem.  What’s up?”

Chat crosses his arms across his chest and stares fixedly at the cake.

“It,” he says, “it just---everything just seems to fall short.  Nothing feels _right_ , nothing feels good enough, I’ve tried citrus cakes, shortcakes, regular yellow butter cakes, you name it but none of it seems right.”

“It’s fine---”

“I know it’s fine,” Chat snarls, his face twisting into a lightning fury that makes Marinette flinch a hair backwards.  “I know its fine, I keep getting told that, but it doesn’t.  Matter.”  He breathes in deeply, once, and exhales slowly, running a hand through his hair.  “It doesn’t feel fine.”

He glances up at Marinette.  “Enough about me,” he mutters.  “Why were you crying?”

“Chat---”

He waves a hand at her.  “Princess,” he says, “I’ve complained about myself enough for one day.  What’s up?”

Marinette just stares at him for a minute; he studiously avoids direct eye contact.

Two weeks had given her more than enough thinking time.

She’d fallen for Adrien because at the end of the day he was a decent person.  Because he had every opportunity to be a complete jerk _a la_ Chloe and he chose instead to be patient and kind and gentle with people, to care about them and treat them as they deserved to be treated.  Which basically described Chat in a nutshell.  In fact the only reason she hadn’t gone after her partner was because A. the flirting thing and B. Chat more or less had the personality of a sugar-amped eight-year-old ninety percent of the time.

And then he’d had to go and show his gentler side.

 _Damn_ him for making her fall in love with him more and more.

“Boy troubles,” she says weakly.

Chat’s eyebrows go up.  “Really?” he says.  “Wasn’t expecting that.”

“Why?” Marinette says, tone flat.

“Uh, please don’t take this the wrong way,” Chat says, “but you’re basically the complete package.”

Marinette blinks.  Once, precisely.

“Uh,” he continues, more hurriedly, “I mean that, uh, ah, you’ve got everything.”

“Keep digging,” Marinette says.

“I mean that---”  He stops and sighs, running a hand through his hair again.  “I mean that you’re kind and wonderful and brilliant and passionate and on top of all that you’re a natural leader and you could practically be a cover model and, well.”

He gives a little shrug. “You’d basically have your pick of romantic partners.  Heck, I think even Chloe wants you, on some level.”

Marinette snorts.  “Chloe?   Chloe Bourgeois?  The same girl that’s made my life hell for four years running?  I somehow doubt that she has a crush on me or anything, and even if she did I wouldn’t say yes.”

“She what?”

“Your buddy Chloe,” Marinette says, “has been bullying me and making my life a nightmare for the past four years.”  Her hand goes up automatically to one of her pigtails.  “I used to have long hair, you know.”

“Oh no,” Chat mutters.  He shifts in his chair, leaning forwards a little.  “I can guess where this is going.”

“Yeah,” Marinette says.  “She ruined it.  ‘Accidentally’ got a bunch of gum in it one day and I had to chop it all off.”

She crosses her arms across her chest and leans back in her chair, fixing Chat with a direct look.  “Let’s just say that she’s pretty far down my list of potential partners.”

A sudden, terrible thought hits her like a sudden splash of acid.  “Is that her?” she asks.  “The girl you’re baking the cake for?”

“No,” Chat says.  “But I’ll have a word with her.”

He rises and places the rest of the cake back in the box, moving carefully.

“Let me see you out,” Marinette says as he turns to go.

“Sure,” Chat says, “thank you.”

The bell hanging above the bakery’s front door jingles as Marinette opens it for Chat; he pauses and turns, looking up at it, then down at her.

“Marinette,” he says, his voice soft and filled with a bedrock-steady sincerity.  “I really can’t thank you enough.”

Marinette rolls her eyes to cover the sudden pounding of her heart.  “No you can’t,” she says, cocking her hips to one side and smiling at him.  “Now go before you’re spotted.”

Chat lets out a low rolling chuckle before he walks out into the night and leaps away.


	5. In Which Our Heroine Lies

Chat’s next visit came only two days later, and Marinette wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not. On the one hand, she had gotten most of her meltdown over the fact that she harbored a crush on her partner out of her system by then, with help from the ever patient Tikki (how Marinette had survived before the Kwami came into her life, she would never know) so she didn’t burst into tears at the sight of him again. But on the other, she was STILL harboring a crush on him while trying to help him win over another girl. Because clearly, she had some sort of unexplored masochistic streak that Alya could NEVER allowed to find out about. Learning to deal with that was going to take some time. 

Time which she apparently wasn’t going to be granted, if the grinning cat presenting her with a new pastry on her doorstep was any sort of indication.

She sort of expected it though, which was why she’d begged her parents to let her use the bakery over the next few nights with the solemn oath to clean it up when she finished. Her parents had obviously been curious about the request, but respected her bid for privacy and just told her to keep the noise to a minimum and make sure she was in bed at a reasonable time.

Not for the first time, Marinette was relieved to have such understanding parents. It made her feel like a failure of a daughter for not being able to be completely honest with them, but she was happy that they trusted her even when she couldn’t explain everything, and that they loved and supported her despite her secrets and evasiveness. She wasn’t sure the deserved it, but she definitely appreciated it, especially now as she accepted the treat that Chat handed her and waved the cat inside, blinking down at the dessert in surprise at its light weight and the slight warmth she could feel through the thin cardboard as she closed the door behind him. Curious, Marinette opened the box to peek inside, eyebrows raising at what she found.

“[A Clafoutis](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.chowhound.com%2Frecipes%2Fcherry-clafoutis-clafouti-29695&t=ODkxODViZWFlOTU3MzM4ODk3YTU3MzY2ZTc4MDQ3NWVlMjQ3M2IwZSxCNlFFNFFCQg%3D%3D)?” she questioned out loud, turning to Chat with a puzzled look which had him rubbing the back of his head and giving her a grin.

“Sorry, I still wanted to bring you something to try, but I think I burned myself out on cakes.” He admitted to the blue-eyed girl. “I don’t know how your dad does it every day honestly. Baking is HARD.”

“It is, but it can be rewarding sometimes too. Especially when other people appreciate the hard work.” Marinette responded with a small smile. “And don’t be sorry. Clafoutis is one of my personal favorite desserts, even more than cake.”

“My mom loved them too. That’s why I figured I’d try and make one.” Chat said with a wistful smile. Marinette’s heart clenched at the look, as well as the use of past tense in his admission. She was sorely tempted to ask for the story behind the pain she could see in her usually goofy cat’s eyes, but restrained herself with great reluctance.

If Chat wanted to share with her, then it was fine. But she wouldn’t push. She had a feeling that Chat wouldn’t appreciate it, and honestly she didn’t know what to say on the issue anyways, as she had never lost a parent before herself.

So instead she smiled at the blond and nudged him towards the bakery’s kitchen. 

“Come on. Let’s have a taste, shall we?” She said, relieved when Chat grinned at her in response as the two of them made their way into her father’s workspace. Setting the Clafoutis down, Marinette began to rummage through drawers for utensils. “You must be getting more comfortable in the kitchen if you’re trying new things on your own. Are you sure you still need me to critique, kitty?”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you were trying to get rid of me, Princess.” Chat said coyly as Marinette turned back to him, forks, knifes and plates in hand.

“Yep. I didn’t want to admit it, but my idea of hell is involves having a superhero fattening me up with homemade sweets. How am I ever going to survive like this?” Marinette deadpanned as she cut into the pastry, earning a laugh from the cat.

“You’re a tough Princess, I’m purr you’d find a way.” Chat insisted, grinning as Marinette moaned.

“A sweet-bearing, PUN cracking superhero. I’m pretty sure that counts as torture in some countries.” Marinette complained.

“Awww come on, you know you love me.” Chat laughed, oblivious to the pain the innocent tease caused the dark haired girl.

“Keep telling yourself that.” Marinette forced herself to say as she passed Chat a piece of his Clafoutis before depositing one on her own plate.

“Glad to, Princess.” Chat replied cheerfully. Marinette rolled her eyes in exasperation before breaking off a piece of the pastry he’d brought her and bringing it to her mouth.

“Not bad.” She hmmed after chewing for a minute, taking another bite. “The mixture is a little uneven, but most people probably wouldn’t even be able to tell. You’re getting better, kitty.”

“Really? And do I get a reward for improving?” Chat asked eagerly with a wide grin. Marinette raised her eyebrow at the cat’s cheek.

“Depends. What sort of reward did you have in mind?” She asked warily. She knew better than to agree to play her partner’s game without knowing the rules.

“Tell me about your crush!” 

Aaaand that’s when the next bite of Clafoutis went down the wrong pipe.

“Princess?!” Chat said in alarm, resting a clawed glove against her back as Marinette choked until the dessert finally dislodged itself from her throat and was promptly spat onto the counter.

Well then. THAT was attractive.

“Give a girl some warning before asking sometime like that, Chat!” Marinette complained before hitting the boy lightly across the chest.

“Sorry. Wasn’t expecting that kind of reaction.” Chat replied, looking both amused and apologetic. Huffing irritably, Marinette turned away from the blond and busied herself by looking for some napkins. “But really though, tell me more about this boy you like.”

“Why do you want to know about something like?” Marinette demanded with a grimace. As if this situation wasn’t awkward enough as it was…

“I wanna help! You’ve been doing so much for me, and I want to help you too!”

“And what makes you so sure that you CAN help me?” Marinette asked in exasperation, shooting the cat a look.

“Hey, I’m a clawesome superhero, remember? If I can manage to save Paris from an evil moth man, then I can give a friend a hand with a guy!” Chat insisted. “Come on, you can tell me! I promise I won’t laugh!” Marinette grimaced at that. Clearly, the boy wasn’t going to let this go, which put her in a tight spot. She didn’t want to lie to her partner, but she couldn’t tell him that he was the guy she liked. Mulling her options over, Marinette finally settled on an answer that, while not ideal, was still a better choice than telling Chat that she liked him.

“It’s… Adrien Agreste.” she admitted, feeling only a little bit guilty at the admission. After all, she DID still harbor feelings for her mild-mannered classmate, and Chat liked someone else, so focusing her feelings on the model instead of her partner was a much safer option than the alternative.

Adrien was sweet. And available. And not Chat.

Chat who, surprisingly enough, went oddly still at her confession, staring at her like she has just thrown a bus at his head.

“Chat?” Marinette ventured when the silence between them began to stretch into an uncomfortable amount of time. That jolted the cat out of his statue impression and made him turn the color of Ladybug’s suit.

“Whoops! Sorry!” Chat laughed awkwardly, suddenly oddly high-strung. “So. Adrien Agreste. Huh.” Marinette raised an eyebrow at the sudden halting manner of speech the cat had adopted.

“You said you wouldn’t laugh.” She reminded him with a slight scowl.

“Not laughing! Definitely not laughing!” Chat told her quickly. “It’s just… wow. Adrien Agreste.”

“Yes. Adrien Agreste.” Marinette confirmed, rolling her eyes at the cat’s behavior, Was it really so unbelievable that she’d like a boy like Adrien?

“…The model?”

Apparently it was. For Chat, at least.

“Yes, Adrien Agreste the model.” Marinette said, tossing an unused napkin at Chat’s face in retaliation for his reaction. “He’s my classmate at school, and he’s very sweet and noble. He’s patient, and he’s friendly, and he works so hard and never complains or anything. I don’t think he realizes how amazing he really is either.”

Chat gave an odd squeak at that, which made Marinette take pause and realize just how red the cat had turned.

“Chat? You okay?” She asked, her earlier annoyance fading into worry over the cat’s odd reaction.

“Yep! Absolutely fine! Never better! But now that you mention it, I really have to go right now and meet up with Ladybug! We have super important strategizing to do tonight! Gotta take down Hawkmoth, you know? So it was super great talking to you and we’ll do this again soon okay!” And with that, the cat literally turned tail and ran, leaving Marinette to stare dumbly in his wake. After a few minutes, Tikki peeked out of Marinette’s jacket pocket to give her chosen a puzzled look.

“I didn’t know Ladybug and Chat were meeting tonight.” She said.

“Neither did I.” Marinette replied as she slowly stood and made her way to the front door to lock it behind the cat.

What on earth was THAT about?


	6. In Which Our Hero Has a Minor Panic Attack Over the Thought That Someone Actually Likes Him, The Tit

Oh shit.  Oh _shit._   _Oh.  Shit._

Adrien tries his best not to hyperventilate as he hurls himself through the chill Parisian night.

Marinette liked him?  Marinette freaking Dupain-Cheng, probably the one person in the world who could hold so much as a candle to Ladybug liked him.   More to the point she liked him for more than just his work, she _liked_ him, and she’d put a bit of thought into it by the sound of it which meant that she probably _like_ liked him which was a phrase that he never thought he’d be using in connection with her and _why_ did even that innocuous thought make his chest feel like someone had set bands of glowing iron around it? 

Well, this wasn’t going to complicate anything, he thinks to himself with an only mildly hysterical giggle.  Nooooot at all, it was just him going to the girl who liked him---and there again the bands of constricting iron searing into his ribs---to get advice on how to bake something for the woman he loved.

God, he was a shithead.

Why had he fallen in love with Ladybug anyways?  And when?  Okay, well, the when bit was easy enough to answer, he’d thought she was pretty cute when they’d literally run into each other and then she’d proved to be more a force of freaking nature, unstoppable in her cause and righteous in her fury and then he was a goner.

But for the life of him he couldn’t recall why, why specifically her instead of---and again the sudden tightness in his chest.  Being in love with Ladybug had at some point just become something habitual, an act as reflexive as flowers blooming in midnight.  And it was real, he knew that, it was as real as the marrow in his bones and the surge of blood through his veins, the fever-warm star that died in his chest every time he saw her, fought beside her, made her laugh or smile at him, with him.

That wasn’t the issue, though.  Well, not the main issue, and not the most relevant.

Ladybug saw him as a business partner, or a friend at best, someone to trust but never to love.  She’d demonstrated that often enough.  And even if the message got across---whenever he finally made something that would meet her standards---that his affection for her wasn’t some transitory teenaged crush.

Well, it wouldn’t do to dwell on the what ifs.  Positive thinking, Agreste, positive thinking.

Adrien doesn’t pause but takes a flying dive through his still-open window, undoing his transformation with a murmur as he stands.

“Finally,” Plagg groans.  “Cheeeeeeese.”

“You know where your stash is, Plagg,” Adrien says as he strips off his tee and slides into his pajamas, then slumps into bed.

Now, Marinette, on the other hand, Marinette wasn’t a what if, Marinette liked---Adrien’s breath stutters in his lungs for a moment---maybe even _like_ liked him.  But he couldn’t take advantage of her that way, use her affection as a replacement for Ladybug’s.

But, stars above he wanted to.

Conflicted, his mind filled with his silent civil war, Adrien drifts off to sleep.


	7. In Which Our Heroine Offers Assistance

A whole miserable, awkward week later, and he STILL didn’t know what to do.

He hadn’t gone to see Marinette at all since discovering her true feelings towards him, suddenly feeling like some sort of voyeur. She didn’t know that he was Adrien, and hadn’t meant to confess to him the way she had. It was wrong for him to take advantage of the anonymity of his alter ego like that to get his classmate to speak to him about such things when she wouldn’t normally, and he wasn’t cruel enough to keep making her help him prepare for his confession to Ladybug when she had feelings for him. No girl deserved to be used and deceived like that, especially not one as kind as Marinette.

 _I still can’t believe she likes me._ He thought, considering all his interactions with the girl once more. Marinette was such an affectionate and courageous girl with so much talent and passion. Who would have guessed that the reason she avoided him the way she did was because she liked him?  _And here I was always worried that the reason she didn’t want to be anywhere near me was because I always reek of camembert…_

He still wasn’t sure if he wished the cheese was actually to blame for Marinette’s habit of shrinking away when she caught sight of him or not.

It would have been easier to deal with if it was, that was for sure.

But her liking him… what even was he supposed to DO about that? Especially since she had confessed her feelings for Adrien to  _Chat_? He couldn’t think of anything he could do that would help with this situation. Talking to her about it as Adrien would probably just drive an even deeper wedge between him and the designer, which was the last thing he wanted. Talking to her about it as Chat would be dishonest and unfair to Marinette when she didn’t have a clue that he was Adrien. And he couldn’t just ignore it or pretend that he wasn’t thinking about it constantly now in either his civilian or superhero personas.

His stunted social growth had gotten him into some weird spots since he started attending school, but this one had him so far out of his depth that he was in an entirely different ocean.

And to make matters worse, he couldn’t stop worrying about the whole situation and ended up getting distracted, which was getting him in trouble at school, on the job and- worst of all- with Ladybug.

“CHAT!” Said spotted heroine yelped in alarm as she lassoed him with her yoyo and yanked hard as a car barreled past on the darkened streets, close enough that Chat could smell the pine air freshener that hung from the rearview mirror.

The blond grunted as he landed on his rear at his partner’s feet, not hurt but definitely surprised. Carefully, the boy tilted his head back until he was staring upside down into the very unhappy blue eyes that had featured into many a dream for the model.

That’s when he flashed her all his teeth in a wide grin.

“My Lady, if you wanted to sweep me off my paws you could have just asked.” He told her cheekily, giving a smart wink. Chat wasn’t sure if it was the line of the look that got him cuffed sharply across the back of the head. Probably both.

“Don’t joke Chat. What on earth is wrong with you that has you walking into oncoming traffic?” Ladybug demanded, real worry hidden behind the anger she was trying to direct at him.

“Personal matters.” Chat answered as he freed himself from Ladybug’s yo-yo string, wondering if it said something about their relationship that he’d become something of an expert at escaping difficult binds. He expected that to end the conversation, since Ladybug had been very clear that their personal lives and superhero duties should never mix. At all. Ever.

“…What sort of personal matters?” Ladybug inquired cautiously after a long enough pause that Chat had assumed the conversation had been dropped. The feline hero stilled at the question, gazing at his partner with wide eyes to find that her earlier anger at his mishap seemed to have disappeared entirely in favor of the kind of loving concern that made his heart do somersaults in his chest. 

“None that you could help me with, my Lady.” He answered honestly, looking away when he saw her face fall at that. How could he talk to her about this when she was part of the problem?

“Is there anyone you can talk to about it?”

“If I could, I would.” Chat told her with a bitter laugh. “But my friends aren’t supposed to know about the superhero thing, and I can’t speak about this with the one person I usually go to when I need to talk about these kind of problems.” Because Marinette was the problem too.

“What about your Kwami? Aren’t they helping you?”

“Plagg’s idea of comfort is cheese and food.” Chat informed her, rolling his eyes. “He’s not bad or anything, but he doesn’t get humans and thinks a lot of the stuff that I worry about is pointless. I’m probably better off talking to a wall then going to him for advice.”

“Then what about my Kwami?”

It took a minute for the implications of that offer to sink into Chat’s mind. Then several more before he could make his vocal cords work well enough to reply.

“…What?”

“My Kwami. Tikki is a great listener, and she gives good advice. She might be able to help you.”

“… …What?”

“Chat, you need to talk to someone. You’re going to get yourself hurt if you keep running around like this. If it wasn’t for me you’d be roadkill right now!” Ladybug huffed, motioning to the street where he’d nearly been run over. “And if you’re like that in costume, then I can only imagine how bad you are without.”

“But, my lady…” Chat said slowly, confusion making his head spin. “I couldn’t talk to your Kwami even if I wanted to. They’re in your Miraculous.”

“Obviously, I mean that I’ll detransform so Tikki can talk to you.” Ladybug told him with an unimpressed stare. “There’s a park not far from here. I’ll detransform over there and give you and Tikki some time alone, and then Tikki can come back to me once she’s done talking to you.” 

“…You’d do that?” Chat asked, strangely overwhelmed by the knowledge that Ladybug was willing to make herself vulnerable to help him. This wasn’t like the situation with Volpina’s Adrien illusion, where she thought a civilian’s life was at stake. This was just Chat being dumb and not knowing how to deal with the idea of his friend having a crush on him and being mixed up over how he felt about her.

“Of course I would.” Ladybug replied. “You’re my friend Chat. I know that there’s some things you can’t tell me, just like there are things I can’t tell you, but that doesn’t change the fact that I care about you and trust you, and that I want you to be okay. And if my Kwami can give you the help you need, then yeah, I’ll detransform so you can talk to her. If you want to.”

Chat felt his throat tighten at the candid answer his partner provided. This was it. This was why he’d fallen so hard for her so fast, and been so reluctant to let go. This wonderfully kind soul, who possessed a love so strong and caring that it could touch the hearts of an entire city.

And yet, a part of him couldn’t help but feel a little selfish and want to know what if felt like to be the center of someone’s universe. The way Ladybug was the center of his. Because it hurt to feel like he was just a prop in his own life, just smiling and nodding as other people made the decisions. And it was jarring to know now that a girl like Marinette could look at someone like him and see something worth loving. Worth praising to a superhero who always thought that being loud and confident was how you impressed people.

“Actually… yeah. I think I’d like that.” Chat said, lips turning upwards when Ladybug flashed him a relieved smile at that.

“Good.” She said, sounding satisfied. “Let’s go then. The park is this way.” Chat nodded silently before falling into step beside Ladybug, well aware of where the park was since he’d had a few outdoor shoots there. Glancing to the side, Chat felt his heartbeat speed up as he studied the profile of Ladybug’s face as she walked, the picture of graceful perfection.

“My Lady?” Chat ventured, swallowing when the scarlet heroine turned to him with a curious look. “Thank you. For wanting to help me.” Ladybug smiled at him at that, taking his hand in her own and giving it a reassuring squeeze.

“Every time, Chaton.” She told him before she continued to lead him to the park, never relinquishing her grip on his hand.

Chat knew she meant it, too.


	8. In Which Our Hero Is Again A Little Tit And Revelations Are Had

Marinette sits and twiddles her thumbs as she sits at the bench, the humming, buzzing bulb of the lamppost behind her casting her shadow out before her, a deep and hungry black against the jaundiced light.  She pointedly stares forwards, not turning her head towards the secluded grove into which Tikki and Chat had gone for their talk, and not straining to hear their low murmurs as they discuss things about which she is not at all curious.  Even though they probably involve the girl that Chat is in love with.

Not interested at all.

Marinette groans and drops her face into her hands, scrubbing at her eyes with the heels of her hands.  Life had been so much simpler before Chat’s last damnable visit.  For that matter life had been simpler before Chat had showed up out of the dark in the first place with that damnable bashful grin of his and his open earnest intentions like a diamond illuminated by a floodlight.  Back then—and was it really only a month or two ago?—she’d just had to worry about not making a complete fool of herself in front of Adrien and balancing superheroing and schoolwork and the occasional crap from Chloe that tipped over from petty and irritating to actually harmful.

Now, apparently, she was playing the lead in some godawful soap opera or something.  Oh!  Will our hapless heroine in love choose her straight-laced classmate or will she fall for the bad boy in black leather?

Ugh.

Marinette briefly muses over joining the nearest nunnery as a pair of footsteps crunch towards her over the dirt path.

To be frank, in her little, darker moments she just sometimes wished that Chat could get over his damn self-esteem issue or whatever it was that plagued him and just _give_ his mystery beau a sample of his baking and be done with it.  And then he could stop walking in through the front door and making her feel these _stupid_ feelings for him and she could stop having the damn daydreams that involved her and him and tropical islands and skimpy clothing—

Some part of her hindbrain, red and black-spotted, taps her in the frontal lobe and points out that there had been a sound that had now stopped and that she should look up.

Marinette looks up into a stranger’s face, his hands in his jacket pockets, his feet planted on the path maybe a meter, meter-and-a-half in front of her, just far enough to make a lunge inconvenient for her.

“Evening,” he says with a disarming smile.  “What’s a pretty lady like you doing outside this late at night?”

Marinette shifts her weight forwards onto the balls of her feet and rests her hands flat on her thighs.  “Just waiting for my friend,” she says, meeting his gaze with a level, steady stare.  In, out.  In, out.

“Come on, no need for that,” the man—boy? man? he was of an age and build where it was hard to tell—says as he walks over to Marinette’s side and slumps into the bench next to her, slinging his arms wide along the back, still grinning.  “Just trying to be gentlemanly here, beautiful.”

Marinette turns her head very slightly to the left for a better view and says nothing.

“Here,” he says, offering her his hand.  “My name’s Richard.  What about yours, gorgeous?  Just your name can’t hurt, can it?”

“Please leave me alone,” Marinette says, flatly.

A flash of sudden anger lights his eyes before he conceals it behind his smile.

“Come on, Princess,” Richard says, “just trying to be a nice guy here.  Wouldn’t want you or your friend getting hurt.”

“Mm.” Marinette rises and takes a few steps forwards, turning slightly to keep the lounging man in her field of view.  She stops and turns to face him fully, hands at her side, as he rises and walks forwards as well.

Well, he’s tall, at least a head taller than she is, she notes absently, but that shouldn’t present too much of an issue.

“While I appreciate your assistance,” Marinette says, picking out her words, “myself and my friend live very close to here, and we are quite capable of getting home.”

“At least your number then?” he insists.  “So I can make sure you get back safely?”

“No,” Marinette says.

His hand lashes out and clamps down on her forearm with what she imagines he thinks is bruising force.  “Now listen here, you bitch,” he snarls.

* * *

“Look, thank you for the advice, but my mind’s made up,” Chat tells Tikki as he tramps back towards the path.  “Look, I’m just going to head home now, just tell Ladybug that, please.”

His ears—the magic set atop his head—twitch of their own accord as they pick up on a distant conversation, then swivel as voices are raised.

He looks in that direction just in time to see a man, towering over a petite girl— _Marinette_.

The world goes red and he lunges forwards with a snarl.

He’s forced to dig in his heels and screech to a stop about half a breath later as Marinette moves.  It’s only thanks to his heightened reflexes that he’s able to make out exactly what happens.

Marinette, her face set in a curiously blank expression of serene concentration, steps backwards, dragging the man down by his arm, then, as he tries to pull back in startled reaction, she rams her knee into his face.  From the lack of any crunching noises he’d guess that she failed to break anything; the flicker of irritation that creases her mouth into a slight frown seems to bear that out.

She settles instead for breaking his grip on her forearm in one sweeping, spinning movement and completing it by lashing out with her elbow.  The blow smashes into his jaw and knocks the man onto his side.

It’s about then that Marinette catches sight of Chat, and Chat realizes that his jaw is hanging open.  “Stay back!” she calls as she takes another two quick steps backwards.  “I got this!”

The man, halfway through rising, looks back over his shoulder, catches sight of Chat, and blanches.  He bolts, sprinting from the circle of light and into the darkness of the park.

“Uh, hey, Chat,” Marinette says as she approaches him, her eyes flickering momentarily to Tikki and then fixing determinedly on him.  “Uh, what are you doing here this late at night.”

“Talking to, uh, talking to,” Chat mumbles, staring back at Marinette.  He gestures at Tikki.  “Her.”

“Uh, okay,” Marinette says.  “You know, you’d better go after that guy, make sure he doesn’t hurt anyone else.”  She points a finger off to the side.  “I’ll just, uh, head back to the bakery good seeing you have a good night bye!”

* * *

Adrien lies awake in his bed, staring at the ceiling.

The talk with Tikki had set the foundation, but seeing Marinette in all her glory, a Valkyrie in capri pants and a cotton tee, her hair loose from its customary pigtails and flying around her face, had cured the proverbial concrete.

He loves Marinette Dupain-Cheng.  At least as much as he loves Ladybug, and with her at least was the certainty that she reciprocated.

But if he genuinely loves her, if he wants to pursue this, he needs to be honest with her.

He rolls out of bed and goes to his desk.  He clicks on the light; a moment’s searching uncovers a sheet of stationary and a pen.  He hesitates, then sets it aside, opens a drawer, and pulls out his calligraphy set.  This was important, after all.

By the light of his desk lamp and the moon shining in through the window, he writes.

* * *

Marinette grumbles to herself as she sits at a counter in the bakery.

Tikki had been sworn to secrecy.  Understandable, but Tikki wouldn’t even give a hint as to whether the general direction of the conversation had been positive or negative.

That in and of itself wasn’t of much concern during week one, or week two, or three.  Week four was of rather more concern.

She was in the middle of week six now.

What in the world had Tikki done to Chat?  Threatened to castrate him or something?  Threatened to hunt down his puppy and throw it off of the Arc d’Triomphe?

She sighs and turns her attention back to the batch of sugar cookie dough that she’d decided to make to pass the time.

There’s a flicker of movement at the corner of her eye, someone standing at the front of the bakery, black against the shadows of the night; a flicker, and then gone.

Marinette hurries forwards, opens the door, looks around into the street, but there’s no one around.  She looks down to find a small cardboard box at her feet, a wax-sealed envelope taped to the top.

“Huh.”

Marinette brings the box in and locks and shutters the front door.  She peels the envelope free and cracks the seal before gently tugging out the stiff, almost card-like paper within.

The message is simple, and written in a curving cursive hand.

_Dear Princess,_

_I’m sorry, but I can’t do this any longer._

_Love,_

_Chat Noir_

A sudden panic seizes her heart and she tears the box open.

Inside is a single, perfect, still steaming-warm clafoutis.


	9. In Which Adrien Breaks Hearts, The Tit

Marinette was used to getting hurt. It came with the territory when you tripped, stumbled and fell your way through life for fifteen years. And that was before facing down superhuman embodiments of rage, rejection and pain became a daily norm for her. She’d long since resigned herself to dealing with bruises, bumps and the occasional sprains with the rare broken bone here and there.

But none of that pain could have prepared her for the absolute heart-shattering loss that came with being essentially dumped by one of your best friends and not knowing what you did to drive them away.

Her first reaction, after it sank in that Chat had essentially sent her the baked equivalent of a break up text, was to storm up to her room in tears. She wasn’t proud to admit that after that she got into a one-sided shouting match with Tikki, which had driven the Kwami into hiding as Marinette sulked on her bed until falling asleep. She knew, deep down, that it wasn’t Tikki’s fault that Chat didn’t want to be around her anymore. Another, deeper part of her understood that this was a good thing logically speaking. After all, it wasn’t wise for Chat to be coming around her house so much, drawing attention to her civilian self and risking her secret identity. And it wasn’t like she’d never see him again. She was Ladybug, for crying out loud, and he was Chat Noir. They were partners. He’d be a part of her life for as long as they had to save Paris together. Marinette knew that Chat adored Ladybug, and that he always would.

It was Marinette he apparently found to be inadequate. And really, who could blame him for that?

The next morning dawned with Marinette looking as terrible as she felt, which lead to her mother fussing over her at breakfast with the fear that she was getting sick. Marinette appreciated the loving worry, leaning into her mother’s soothing touches and hugs, but insisted she was well enough to go to school despite Sabine’s doubts.

She didn’t want to lie around in bed and sulk all day. She missed enough school as it was without calling off because she couldn’t handle rejection.

Not that that mentality made her school day any easier. Between Chloe and Sabrina loudly giggling about how awful she looked and the teacher’s scolding her for spacing out ever few minutes, which culminated with Mlle. Mendeleiev losing her patience entirely and sending Marinette to the principal’s office. There she received a lecture about staying focused and not staying up all night playing games on the internet that lasted until lunch break.

As she walked miserably down the school’s steps to head home for lunch, Marinette half hated herself for not listening to her mother and staying home from school that day when she obviously wasn’t doing herself any favors by showing up.

That was when the sneak attack came at her from behind.

The pig tailed girl shrieked loudly when arms suddenly wrapped her in a vice-like grip, physically lifting her off the ground so her flats dangled about five inches above the next step. Battle instincts stirred to life, numbing the misery that had enveloped her all day as she geared herself to attack, curling her leg to strike backwards at her assailant’s knee.

Or at least, that was her plan until she realized exactly who had grabbed her.

“Alya?!” Marinette said, trying to turn as much as she could to get a better look at her friend. The blogger smiled at her from over her shoulder before setting her gently back on her feet, giving one last affectionate squeeze before letting her friend go.

“Hey there, Miss Frowney Face. What’s happening?” The auburn haired girl asked teasingly. A light flush made it’s way to Marinette’s cheeks and she glowered at the other girl sullenly.

“Don’t DO that! I almost had a heart attack!” She complained, a little unsettled at how close she’d been to breaking her best friend’s knee. That would have been a spectacular way to make an already bad day even worse.

“Sorry girl.” Alya laughed. “But you looked like you needed a hug. Badly.”

“You can say THAT again.” A voice chimed in, making Marinette turn to find most of her classmates lingering on the steps. Marinette frowned at Kim, the one who had spoken, as he approached and playfully tousled her hair. “We were all totally prepping for a visit from Akuma-Marinette a couple minutes after Mendeleiev sent you off.”

“YOU were, you mean.” Alix corrected the jock smugly as she elbowed him in the ribs Before holding out her hand. “Pay up, loser.”

“You guys bet I’d get Akumatized?” Marinette demanded, giving the pair an unimpressed look as Kim grumbled and dug out some euros to deposit into Alix’s waiting hand.

“THIS idiot did. I’ve seen you tough it out through worse than Mendeleiev and Chloe, so I figured you’d be fine.” Alix responded gleefully as she counted her winnings.

“Yeah yeah. But you didn’t disagree when I said that she’d be, like, the scariest Akuma EVER. I mean, can you even imagine her all mean and scary and throwing around sewing needles everywhere? Ladybug and Chat Noir would probably get a total beat down trying to change HER back.” Kim moaned, leaning against Marinette until her knees began to buckle.

“Guys that’s not funny.” Marinette scolded them, though she couldn’t stop the smile from coming to her face as she did so.

“We were all worried about how sad you’ve been all day and wanted to try to cheer you up!” Rose told Marinette happily as she hooked her arm through Marinette’s elbow while Juleka smile shyly behind the tiny blonde. “You’re always doing the same thing for us, after all!”

“It was Adrien’s idea. He can’t come himself because he has some modeling stuff scheduled during the lunch break, but he thought you looked like you could use some friends.” Nino told her with a warm, knowing  smile. Marinette felt her heart skip a beat at that. Adrien had noticed that she was upset? And he wanted to make her feel better? A warm smile came unbidden to her lips at the blond’s kindness, making her glow as Alya and Nino shared knowing grins over her shoulder.

“According to my research, there’s an arcade nearby here that is offering free pizza and sodas to anyone who can beat their high score on Ultimate Mecha Strike IV. Considering that the current placeholder only managed to secure a paltry 20,100, it should be quite simple for you to claim the top spot for yourself.” Max informed them, holding his phone out to Marinette so she could see the advertisement for herself.

“Did someone say free pizza?!” Alix asked, grinning as she grabbed Max’s phone to read the ad and ignoring the boy’s protests. “Now THAT sounds like my kinda lunch!”

“Shouldn’t Marinette get a say in this?” Ivan asked, looking exasperated as Mylene giggled at his side.

“Well girl?” Alya asked slyly. “Wanna make some poor noobs cry?”

“Actually, that sounds like the perfect way to spend lunch.” Marinette replied, grinning as everyone cheered. Alya looped and arm around Marinette’s shoulders to guide the girl as they followed Max’s lead to the arcade, and the designer smiled and rested her head against Alya’s shoulder as the others all swarmed around her, happy chatter filling the air as they protected her from the rest of the world. Losing Chat the way she had still hurt. It probably would for a long time still. But she’d be alright.

What else could she possibly be, with friends like these?

* * *

When school finally ended and Marinette found herself back in her bedroom, it was with a heavy sense of guilt and anxiety. The afternoon classes went much better than her morning did, thanks to the care shown to her by her classmates, but there were still issues at hand that needed to be addressed, including a big one for which there was no one to blame but herself.

Steeling herself with a deep breath, Marinette opened her clutch and stared down into the big, blue eyes of her Kwami.

“Tikki?” She began cautiously, biting her lip. “Last night… The things I said to you…” Before Marinette could go any further with her apology, Tikki flew out of the bag, nuzzling herself affectionately against Marinette’s cheek.

“It’s okay, Marinette.” Tikki told her softly, her voice so full of warmth and affection that it brought tears to her Chosen’s eyes. “I understand why you were upset. It’s difficult to be in the middle of something and not being given all the information. It’s okay to feel frustrated when things are like that.”

“Maybe,” Marinette choked as she wiped at the tears in her eyes. “But it’s not okay to take things out on you like that. And I’m so sorry I did, Tikki, you didn’t deserve that. Not at all.”

“Please don’t cry, Marinette.” Tikki begged as she touched her hand softly against Marinette’s face. “I forgive you. I know you were in pain and that you didn’t mean to lash out.”

“I’m such a failure of a hero.” Marinette moaned in frustration. “I get jealous, or angry, or-!”

“You are not a failure, Marinette.” Tiki told her sharply. “You’re human. And I would never expect you to be anything else.”

“But I’m supposed to be Ladybug.” Marinette reminded her Kwami, her voice tight with frustration. “I’m supposed to help people, not hurt them. The things I say and do-“

“Marinette.” Tikki said, her voice firm and motherly in it’s kindness. “You were chosen to be Ladybug because you are kind and compassionate. And the reason you can be kind and compassionate is because you can feel anger and hurt as well, which is why you can understand and want to help other people who get lost in thier suffering. Be sorry when you step over a line that you shouldn’t, but never be afraid of those feelings or try to bury them because of your responsibilities as Ladybug. Your emotions are always important, even when they are negative.” Marinette smiled at that, cupping her hands around Tikki and bringing the Kwami to her for a soft kiss on the forehead.

“Thank you.” She said, earning a fond smile from the small immortal.

“Do you feel up for a patrol tonight?” The Kwami asked. “I know it’s your night to patrol alone, but I can contact Plagg if you want to rest. It’s been a long day for you.”

“Thanks, but I’ll be fine.” Marinette replied. “Besides, a little exercise and fresh air will help clear my head.”

“In that case, I’m ready when you are.” Tikki said, flipping happily through the air and earning a laugh from her charge before a determined gleam entered Marinette’s eyes.

“Tikki!” She began confidently as she drew herself up to her full height. “Spots On!”

As the warm light of transformation enveloped her Marinette felt as though all the invisible weights of the day lifted right off her shoulders. She was invincible now. Powerful. _Ladybug._

And she was definitely going to be okay.

* * *

Leaping across rooftops and swinging by the thread of a magic yo-yo wasn’t exactly like flying, but it was close enough for Marinette. She got into enough trouble with four limbs, she didn’t need to add wings to the mix and make things that much harder on herself. Besides, there was a chance that if she could fly, she’d spend even more time with her head in the clouds (this time in a much more literal sense) which would be counterproductive to the fact that she was supposed to be looking out for any trouble.

Trouble like the two men with knives who were tailing after a smaller figure in a hoodie with an arm full of plastic bags.

Ladybug’s eyes narrowed on the scene below her as the boy opened his bag to check his purchases, muttering something to himself as he remained blissfully unaware of the danger lurking ever closer to him. The young superheroine tensed as adrenaline began to buzz through her veins, leaping silently off of her tall perch to land in a silent crouch between the men and their intended victim. The two men in front of her cursed in their surprise, which drew a startled gasp from the boy behind her, but Ladybug paid the noises little mind and she sprang forward to attack.

Fighting non-Akumatized humans was always a tedious affair in control, which was why she’d insisted that Chat Noir refrain from fighting off her assailants that fateful night so long ago, especially considering how angry he’d looked. After all, the instinct when fighting was to give it your all, but when you had superhuman strength and agility pitted against average human abilities, the average humans tended to lose out. Badly. Potentially fatally. And since her fighting style was a little less personal than Chat’s, she generally was better at disarming human opponents and delivering them to the police rather than the hospital.

With this in mind, Ladybug let her yo-yo sing through the air to wrap around the first mugger’s hands and knife, quickly diving between his legs to drag him into a roll which left him lying on his back, winded and weaponless.

“That’s one down.” Ladybug said as she dragged her yo-yo back in, frowning distaste fully at the switchblade she now held between her thumb and index fingers. She wasn’t much fond of knives. Weapons in general were pretty nasty in her experience, but knives were something she took special offense to as a crime fighter. Mostly because it was hard to remember that you’re wearing an impenetrable magical suit when someone comes at you with 8 inches of sharpened steel.

As the blue eyed girl tossed the weapon a safe distance away, the second would-be thief gave a yell and ran. Not towards Ladybug, but to the unarmed boy he’d been planning to attack, clearly intent on changing him from a victim to a hostage. Ladybug tensed and was about to intercept the mugger before he could make good his intent, but a slight change in posture from the hooded boy made her pause in confusion.

The thief didn’t notice the subtle change and continued his charge, only to have the boy evade his knife and redirect his arm away by catching his wrist and elbow. With a fluid, practiced motion, the boy closed the distance between him and the larger man to bring his arm up before he twisted it to the side, making the thief cry out in pain and drop his knife before the boy buried his knee into the man’s kidneys.

Letting go, the boy stepped back and watch his assailant drop to the ground, clutching his injured arm and curling in on himself. Ladybug gaped, blue eyed wide, as the boy’s hood fell back, revealing golden hair and green eyes set into a perfect, tan face.

Adrien Agreste. She had just watched sweet, gentle, friendly Adrien Agreste ward off a man with a knife like he’d done it a million times before.

…And it was a little worrying that that thought was oddly attractive.

“Adrien?” Ladybug squeaked. LADYBUG squeaked. Like a mouse. Gloved hands flew to her mouth as her cheeks went red with embarrassment over the way her voice betrayed her and ruined the cool and poised image that Ladybug was supposed to have going on for her.

“Ah, my La- Ladybug!” Adrien responded, turning quite red himself as he scratched the back of his head awkwardly. Ladybug’s eyes furrowed at the odd stumble he’d made over his words has he been about to call her…? “H-hi! Thank you! Um, for the save I mean.” Shaking off her confusion, Ladybug took a moment to compose herself before smiling back at her classmate.

“You’re welcome. Although,” She considered as she eyed the man writhing at Adrien’s feet, “it kinda looks like you had it under control.”

“Haha, y-yeah. Fencing, you know?” Adrien replied, grinning at her.

“Yeah, I know.” Ladybug responded before she remembered that ‘Ladybug’ wasn’t supposed to know that Adrien fenced. “I mean! I can imagine! Since. You know. Sharp, pointy things and… Um… Stuff…?” Please. Someone, anyone, show some mercy and shut her up please?!

The answer to her silent prayer, unexpectedly enough, came from the criminal she’d subdued, who managed to get back to his feet during their fumbling attempts at a conversation and took off running down a narrow alleyway.

“Ladybug!” Adrien said sharply, tracking the assailant’s movements with his eyes. The heroine didn’t bother responding to his warning, already hot in pursuit of the escaping criminal. Using her yo-yo to latch onto a nearby overhang, Ladybug took to the air over the mugger’s head, dropping down in front of him to sweep his legs out from underneath him with a graceful roundhouse kick before popping back to her feet, hands at her hips as she regarded the groaning man on the ground before her.

“I wouldn’t recommend trying that again.” She told him coolly. Hoping to keep any more escape attempts at a minimum, Ladybug snagged some heavy chains that were locking up a nearby area by snapping the padlock off with ease, using them to rope off the man’s hands and tie him to a drainage pipe, breaking off the last link to bend it through two other links as a makeshift tie off. “Just wait here until the cops come to collect you, alright?”

“Can you at least be kind enough to knock me out so I don’t have to listen to you and that kid flirt anymore?” The mugger grumbled. Ladybug felt her cheeks turn red and swore the could almost hear Tikki giggling at her from the back of her mind. Refusing to acknowledge the man’s words, Ladybug turned away with her nose in the air and marched primly out of the alleyway.

And directly into Adrien’s chest.

“Oh!” She gasped as his bag fell to the ground, spilling it’s contents everywhere. A carton of eggs smashed against the cement, and a carton of cream rolled away into a nearby gutter as a bag of flour landed on Ladybug’s foot. The spotted heroine cringed as her classmate dropped to the ground and grabbed the back, taking an unconscious step back.

“Sorry!” Adrien apologized hastily.

“N-no! It’s my fault!” Ladybug insisted, jogging over to the cream carton. “Here, let me-!” The rest of her words, her offer to help, trailed away when she picked up the carton and found a small, folded sheet of paper stuck to the dampness that dewed along it’s surface. Assuming that the paper was just discarded trash but thinking it better to check anyways, Ladybug peeled it free and shook it open, eyeing the clean, neat handwriting that hadn’t been soiled by water damage with widening eyes.

> _Mix at room temperature eggs then dry ingredients, shifting first._
> 
> _Round cake pan. Turntable. Frosting Spatula._
> 
> _Ask Princess about how to make those flower decorations next time we meet!_

Marinette didn’t notice the cream slipping from her hands to fall back to the ground, or the way Adrien turned at the sound to find the heroine standing frozen with the sheet of paper in her hands.

No.

Nononononononono-!

“Ladybug?” Adrien said somewhere behind her, sounding concerned. “Is… Is something wrong?”

Ladybug’s head snapped up at that, blue eyes wide in shock and horror as they met a familiar green gaze. It couldn’t be. It didn’t matter how much sense it made, because it just couldn’t be true. Adrien Agreste couldn’t be-!

_“Tell me about your crush!”_

_“It’s… Adrien Agreste.”_

Ladybug barely even heard Adrien shout out behind her when she turned and fled, paper fluttering innocently from her hand when she dropped it in favor of her yo-yo. She was only dimly aware of her surroundings flying by as she made a record breaking sprint across the rooftops back to her home, heart pounding in her ears and breath labored as her eyes stung with unshed tears. She didn’t stop until she had dived through her trapdoor into her room, releasing her transformation midair before landing on her bed in a crouch.

“Marinette?” Tikki fussed worriedly flying closer to try and figure out what was wrong. The pigtailed girl barely heard her, though, instead clambering down to her work area and looking around frantically for the evidence she needed. She found Chat’s clafoutis, untouched, sitting at her desk, and tore the note from it’s box before tearing another note down from her cork board, Adrien’s Valentine poem. Hands trembling, she lined both papers up for comparison, eyes flitting from one to the other in hopes of finding evidence that she was wrong.

It was the same handwriting.

Adrien Agreste and Chat Noir were the same person.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng had unwittingly confessed to her love to Adrien. To Chat.

And he’d rejected her.


	10. In Which Things Get Better

_Waaa waaa waaa waaa waaa—_

Sabine’s hand slaps down on the snooze button hard enough to jar the alarm clock off of the nightstand.  It dangles by its power cord for a minute, clattering against a half-open drawer until Tom rolls over and reaches over Sabine, placing it back on the nightstand.

“Time to get up, dear,” Sabine mumbles into her pillow.

“Must we?” Tom says.

By degrees, the two of them roll off of the bed and begin their morning routine.  They brush their teeth, and while Tom takes a shower Sabine heads down to the kitchen to start a pot of coffee.  She measures out half a dozen tablespoons of grounds, tosses them in a paper filter, and lets the drip coffee machine do its work while she starts slicing a baguette from the last batch of last night into thick slices.  She takes a jar of grape jelly and another of strawberry jam from a cabinet as the coughing gurgle of the machine stops with a few spurts of steam and sets them on the dining room table before she goes to toss the spent grounds.

She frowns in confusion down at the contents of the trash can, the cogs in her brain clunking together as she approaches full wakefulness.

“Did the raccoons get in again?” Tom says dryly as he comes up behind Sabine, hugging her briefly.

“Tom,” Sabine says as he grabs the butter dish and sits down to breakfast, “were you sleep-baking again?”

“Lies and slander,” Tom says as he spreads a pat of butter thinly over a slice of baguette.

“I’m serious, Tom,” Sabine says.  “There’s a clafoutis in here.  I don’t even remember buying cherries.”

Tom pauses mid-chew and, after a moment, comes up and looks down into the trash can.

“Huh.”

“Was Marinette down in the bakery again?” Sabine asks.

“I think so,” Tom says.  “She’s been down there most nights now.”

“I’ll go talk to her about wasting food,” Sabine sighs, tossing the grounds into the trash.

“What, now?” Tom says as Sabine marches upstairs.  “It’s four in the morning.”

“I’m aware, dear,” Sabine calls back.

Sabine composes her features into an expression of stern disapproval before she opens the trapdoor and pokes her head into Marinette’s darkened room.

“Marinette?” Sabine says.  “Wake up dear, we need to talk.”

The room remains quiet, and Sabine sighs and climbs fully into her room, letting the trapdoor come down with a quiet _boom_.  She walks over to the wall and flicks on the room lights.

“Marinette,” Sabine says again, her tone a little sharper.  After another minute of silence she sighs again and climbs up the staircase to Marinette’s bed.

She finds her daughter curled into the fetal position, her breathing still the light and steady pattern of deep sleep.  By her head her sheets are stained and dark; Sabine reaches down with a frown and touches them.

Damp.

Her daughter had sobbed herself to sleep.

Sabine feels the old, familiar, topaz-hard fury settle in her bones.  The last time this had happened had been—what, nearly a year now, when that arrogant brat of a girl had slapped a wad of gum into her hair and gotten away scot-free?  It took a lot to get her daughter to cry.

Not that it matters.  Someone is going to pay.

Tom sees the look on Sabine’s face as she descends the stairs.

“Her again?” Tom says, his voice flat and neutral.  He sips from his mug of coffee.

“Likely,” Sabine says.  Tom grunts.

“Which one of us?” Tom says.

“I’ll talk to her,” Sabine says.

They finish breakfast in silence.  Tom gets up and puts his plate in the sink, then gives Sabine a perfunctory kiss on the mouth before he goes down to the bakery.  Sabine stays a little while longer, lingering over her coffee, before she gets up and washes and dries the dishes.  She considers going back up to Marinette’s room but decides against it.

Well, there were the Girard accounts to go through anyways.

* * *

Marinette wakes up with her face glued to the sheets by dried mucus, her face crusty with the remains of tears.

She peels the sheets from her face, walks carefully down the staircase, washes her face off with cold water and dabs at the redness around her eyes until it fades a little.

She looks into the mirror for a second, then quickly looks away.

Marinette trundles back up to her bed, stares at her sheets.  After a couple minutes’ indecision she strips them from her bed and trundles back down and through the trapdoor.

“Morning, dear,” Sabine says to her daughter as Marinette walks past and stuffs her sheets into the washing machine.

“Morning, Mama,” Marinette answers woodenly, and makes to head back up to her room.

“Oh, no you don’t,” Sabine says, motherly harmonics stopping Marinette dead in her tracks.  “Sit.  Eat.  I’m not having any daughter of mine waste away.”

“Yes, Mama,” Marinette says, and sits at the table.

There’s a plate laden with slices of toasted baguette, an open jar of jam with a butter knife laid across its mouth.

Marinette picks up the knife, spreads a thin layer of jam across a slice of toast, takes a bite, chews and swallows.

“I’m not really hungry, Mama,” she mutters, putting the slice back down and getting up.

“What’s wrong?” Sabine says.

“There’s nothing wrong, Mama,” Marinette says, continuing towards the stairs.

Sabine purses her lips and pauses in her typing as Marinette starts to trudge back up to her room.

“Does it have anything to do with that nice Adrien boy and the clafoutis I found in the trash?” Sabine says carefully, neutrally.

Marinette stops.

Sabine puts her reading glasses down and rushes forwards as Marinette collapses to her knees and starts crying softly.

“Oh no, Marinette,” Sabine murmurs to her, cradling her in her arms, “Marinette, Marinette, shhh, it’s all right.”

“Why aren’t I good enough, Mama,” Marinette whimpers.  “Why aren’t I good enough, don’t I try?  Why aren’t I good enough for him?”

“Shhh, shhh, shhh,” Sabine murmurs, again and again, until the tears slow and stop.  She lets go of her daughter as she rises, wiping at her eyes.

“I’m sorry, Mama,” Marinette says.  “I’ll just go get ready for school---”

“To hell with school,” Sabine says, smiling.  “I’ll call you in sick for today.  I think the both of us need a day off.”

“Mama---”

“How does the arboretum sound?”

Marinette looks down at her mother through her blurred vision.

“It sounds fine, Mama,” she says.

* * *

Marinette sits with her sketchbook open on her lap later in the evening, pencil resting in her loose grip as she stares blankly ahead of her.

Right.  Right, she‘s _not_ going to let her life be dictated by this one thing, she’s _not_ going to let herself be hung up over the simple fact that Adrien wasn’t in love with her, either of her, and wow was that sentence awkward.

Marinette lets her vision refocus and shuts her sketchbook.  “Papa?”

“Yes, Mari?” Tom says after a moment’s hesitation.

“I’m going to go downstairs,” Marinette says.  “Make something for my class.”

“All right, dear,” Tom says.  “Be sure to remember to shut off the oven when you’re done.”

“Yes, Papa.”

She’s all right, Marinette reminds herself as she goes downstairs and starts pulling out ingredients from the refrigerator and various cabinets.  She’s all right.  So long as Adrien—her _friend_ , remember that, her _friend_ —was happy.

It didn’t matter if he was happy with her specifically.  Just that he was happy, and laughing, and smiling.

Her hands jerk spasmodically for a moment as she digs out her Papa’s macaron recipe, printed on stiff card paper, and sticks it up where she can glance at it while she’s working.  She lets muscle memory take over her movements while her mind wanders.

Who was his mystery beau, though?  He’d denied that it was Chloe, and he hadn’t seemed particularly interested in any of the other girls in their class.  Nino, then?  No, wait, he’d mentioned a _girl_ in particular.

So, someone outside of their class?  Perhaps someone he’d met through fencing, or piano.  Or maybe fencing and piano.

That would be just her luck.  A fencer, lithe and strong and nimble, and a talented musician that probably got standing ovations and the adoration of her audience regularly.  That would be just her luck, Adrien falling in love with someone like that, someone on a pedestal so freaking high that she’d need a telescope to see her.

Marinette sighs and starts piping out little rounded dollops of batter while the oven steadily warms with quiet clicks.

Although frankly she wouldn’t blame him.  Someone like that would have their choice of romantic partners, so why not go after Adrien.  People at the top of the pile deserved each other.

Marinette slides the tray of cookies into the oven, sets the timer, and flicks on the oven light before she slumps into a chair, staring blankly through the front glass pane.

Lessee, she’d be tall, and slim, long blond hair---waist length? or would it drop to just below her shoulder blades? long either way---with brown---no, hazel---eyes, that would flash an amber orange when struck by the sunlight.  She’d be composed and poised, and sure of her body---the fencing would help with that, you couldn’t fence and be clumsy at the same time, at least not well---and maybe, what the hell, maybe she was a model too.

 _Beep beep beep_ \---

Marinette shuts off the timer and the oven, dons a pair of oven mitts, and pulls out the baking sheet laden with macarons.

As she’s reaching for the bowl of filling, she sees a dark shape move in front of the bakery door and stop, their outline fragmented and ghostly through the metal shutters and the indoor lights reflected from the front windows.

She waits a second, heat seeping through the material of the mitts.

The figure waits there, shifting slightly.

Slowly, she puts the sheet down; slowly, she picks up the bread peel, resting beside the huge black iron door of the bread oven, then, after a moment’s thought, puts it down and hefts a long-handled cast iron pan lightly in a hand.

She approaches the door, unlocks and pulls back the security shutter, and squints through the glass.

Adrien’s standing there, shifting his weight from foot to foot.  He gives a little wave as he notices her.

Marinette reaches down and unlocks the front door and pulls it open.

“Uh, hey,” Adrien says with manic brightness as she puts the pan off to one side and stares at him.

“Evening,” Marinette says, mostly hiding the tremble in her voice.

“Nice night out,” Adrien says.

“It, uh, is,” Marinette says.

“Anyways I made you something,” Adrien says quickly after a moment’s silence.  “Figured I’d deliver it before it got cold.”

The world freezes as she sees the little cake box in Adrien’s hands.

He dared, he _dared_ come to her when he’d already declared that the two of them wouldn’t be together, he _dared_ come to her when he’d chosen another, he _dared_ to do this to the heart of his beau, dared to be unfaithful and a fair-weather friend.  In her mind’s eye his statue, so carefully polished and gleaming and cared for shatters into dust, a billion firefly motes glowing with the furnace heat of her building fury.

Her hand comes up and slaps the cake box from his hand with force enough that it practically explodes.  Adrien jumps at the sudden violence, eyes wide with shock.

“Go away,” she spits at him, and slams the door in his face.


	11. In Which the Metaphorical Bandaids Are Brought Out (And Fail to Do Anything)

“Well THAT was unexpected.”

Adrien was too stunned and heartbroken to string together a response to his Kwami, still staring shell-shocked at the closed door. His entire walk to the bakery, he had imagined Marinette’s reaction to his confession. Imagined her jumping into his arms, or going red and stammering before finally saying yes. He imagined kissing her, or at least trying to gather the courage to, or being invited in to sit down and eat cake with her once more, this time as Adrien rather than Chat.

He hasn’t prepared himself for rejection. Not from Marinette.

He was used to Ladybug shooting him down, dismissing his attraction to her as a joke, but Marinette was supposed to be different. Marinette said she liked him, and he liked her. She was supposed to say yes. He was so sure that she would.

And she didn’t.

“Adrien? You okay kid?” Plagg asked, a rare tone of worry in his voice. Still Adrien didn’t respond, overwhelmed by the sudden pain that replaced the shock of Marinette’s unexpected rejection. He didn’t even register falling to his knees, tears in his eyes as his heart shattered when reality finally set in.

 _Go away._ She had told him before he could even confess.

 _Go away._ She said to Adrien when she opened her door to Chat.

_Go away._

_Go away._

**_Go away._ **

“Adrien?” The Kwami pressed again, the concern in his voice growing. Before he could say anything else though, his ears gave a twitch as his eyes widened in alarm and he suddenly dived back into Adrien’s jacket. Not even a second later, the bakery’s door opened again and a large shadow was cast over the young model.

“Adrien?” Tom Dupain said, surprise flashing across his face at the sight of the boy on his stoop. Shame and embarrassment welled up in the blond and he hastily climbed to his feet, wiping at his tears with his hands.

“I’m… I’m sorry sir.” He apologized to the man’s shoes, too afraid to meet his eyes. “I’ll be going now. I just-!”

Before Adrien could finish his escape, a large hand settled gently on his shoulder, radiating a calm warmth and kindness.

“Sabine! I’ll be back in a few minutes!” He called in to his wife, getting an affirmative cry before he shut the door behind him and carefully guided Adrien to the park. The same park he’d spoken to Ladybug’s kwami at, ironically enough.

The two settled down on an iron wrought bench, Adrien probably looking pretty ridiculous with his red eyes and tear stained face next to the abnormally large man. But somehow, the blond couldn’t bring himself to care about how he looked. For a few minutes, they just sat silently as the sounds of the park rang all around them. It felt as though the cheerful birds singing in the trees and the children giggling loudly as they played while a happy couple walked their dog existed on a completely different plain than he did, but somehow he was still aware of the man next to him. Calm, and silent and gentle.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Tom asked, his voice kind and neutral in a way he didn’t expect and wasn’t used to. Adrien gave a hard swallow before he replied.

“I… I don’t even know what I did wrong.” He said shakily, hating the way he sounded like he was whining. Tom gave a sympathetic hum at hearing that.

“Those fights are always the worst ones.” He said knowingly before sighing. “I can’t really claim to know what’s wrong either. Marinette’s been unusually secretive for a while now, but lately something happened and it’s broken her heart. As her father, it hurts me to see her this way.”

“I’m sorry.” Adrien said, even though he wasn’t sure what he was apologizing for. Tom smiled sadly in reply.

“Adrien, I love my daughter very much and I’d never in a million years want to see her hurt. But there are some pains even a father can’t protect their child from. And sometimes it comes from the people we love. People who can hurt us the most and not even knowing it.” Adrien bowed his head at that, grief and shame overwhelming him until Tom’s hand settled comfortingly on his back. “You care about my daughter, Adrien. And I know she cares very much about you. Give her some time to cool off, and try to talk to her. It’s always important to communicate, especially when someone is upset.”

“She doesn’t want to talk to me.” Adrien told the man forlornly.

“She will.” Tom said, with utmost confidence.

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because she hurt you, and she’s going to have to own up to that eventually.” Tom answered. “I know my daughter, Adrien. She’ll talk to you sooner or later. But how soon it happens is probably going to depend on you.” Adrien stared for a minute, his inner turmoil beginning to wane slightly by the larger man’s continued calm and the sound advice he was getting. Tom thought he could fix this. He had to, or else he wouldn’t have bothered to talk to him like this.

But there was one thing the superhero didn’t quite understand…

“Why are you helping me?” Adrien wondered, frowning up at the man. “I don’t know what I did, but I obviously must’ve messed up big to get a reaction like that. You’re her father, shouldn’t you be mad at me too? Why are you being so kind?” A warm chuckle came from the large baker at that question, as if it was a silly thing for Adrien to ask.

“Isn’t it obvious?” Tom asked, a small smile on his lips as he looked down at the blond. “It’s because I love her too, of course.”

* * *

 

He catches her the next day after school on the steps where he loaned her his umbrella so long ago. She’s been studiously avoiding him all day after coming to class fifteen minutes late with a halfhearted apology and then slinking to her seat without meeting his eye, and Adrien didn’t want to press the issue in public. Now though she couldn’t run away, and from the way her posture stiffened at the sight of him, she knew it as well as he did.

“We need to talk.” Adrien told her, keeping his voice steady and firm despite his growing anxiety.

“I don’t have anything to say to you, Adrien.” Marinette replied, though she sounded more tired than angry.

“I don’t think that’s true, Marinette.” The model replied with a frown. He started forward, instinctively going to put his hand on her shoulder, but froze when he saw how she tensed further at his approach and quickly retreated to his former distance before she got upset about him invading her personal space. “Please, just five minutes? I just want to know what I did wrong.” Adrien sounded broken as he admitted that, and he knew it, but to his relief if actually seemed to get through to the girl since she gave a sigh that seemed to make her whole body deflate before nodding silently to Adrien’s request. The blond nearly smiled as hope flared to life once more.

He didn’t know what the problem was, but there was still a chance. He could fix this. He had to.

“Not here, though.” Marinette demanded, frowning off to the side where some of their classmates weren’t even trying to pretend that they weren’t shamelessly watching the pair. Adrien nodded, willing to agree to just about anything at this point if it would get the girl talking.

“Your place?” He suggested. The bakery was a few scant seconds away, and far more private then the steps of the school.

“My parents are there.” Marinette reminded him, shaking her head as she rejected the idea. “Just… follow me, okay?” Adrien gave a quick nod before falling into step behind Marinette as she silently led him away from the school.

The atmosphere seemed to press down around them, thick and omnipresent in a way that did nothing to relieve Adrien’s anxiety as Marinette finally stopped at a small, secluded area on the bank of the Seine. Though this appeared to be the spot that she wanted to bring him to, she didn’t turn around to face him, and didn’t speak. Just stood silent and tense, looking small and sad and completely out of his reach.

Swallowing hard, Adrien took the plunge and began talking first.

“Yesterday your dad said you’ve been upset the last couple of days, and that it has something to do with me.” He started, quiet but steady. “I know you looked down the other day at school, but it seems like it’s gotten worse, and if it is my fault I want to know what I did.” That plea got a laugh from Marinette, devoid of all humor.

“You didn’t do anything Adrien.” She said, her voice flat and emotionless. “Chat Noir did. Chat’s the one who showed up at my doorstep out of the blue because he wanted to learn to bake to impress the girl he likes. Chat’s the one I thought was my friend, who I told things because I trusted him and wh-who decided that… that I wasn’t worth it. That he just couldn’t ‘do this any longer.’ And he didn’t even tell me that to my face. He j-just left a note. I couldn’t even ask what I did wrong, or why he suddenly pulled away because he just left a note and vanished. And do you want to know what the worst part is?” Adrien couldn’t bring himself to ask. He was too busy dealing with the onrush of guilt at the girl’s words.

He hadn’t realized that Marinette would be THIS upset about Chat ‘leaving’ her. Marinette wasn’t like him, after all. She was popular and well-liked by all of their classmates, excluding Chloe. And she’d almost seemed annoyed with Chat’s constant visits on occasions. Which made sense, given that he was basically intruding upon her sleep so she could help him. And if Chat was the one she was upset with, why would she take it out on-?

“The worst part.” Marinette told him turning around at last. Adrien felt his breath catch when he saw the tears in her eyes. “Is that I recognized his handwriting on the note he left. It was the same as one of my classmates. The one I told Chat I liked.”

Adrien swore his heart just up and stopped in that moment.

His mind shut down entirely as ice seemed to coarse through his veins. All he knew, all he could taste was panic in the worst way possible. She knew. He didn’t know how she’d gotten ahold of Adrien’s handwriting, but she had and now she knew that he was Chat Noir. There was absolutely no doubt about that.

“I… uh…” Adrien stammered, trying to think of something- anything- to say to the girl. “Marinette, I swear I never meant to-!”

“-to turn up at my house and make me think that you were someone else so I’d tell you things I never would have if I knew who you really were under the mask?” Marinette finished for him, eyebrows furrowing in anger as the tears caught in her eyelashes. “Or to just up and leave with that stupid note so I had no idea why someone I thought was my friend would suddenly up and abandon me? Or what about the way you just keep showing up at my house and _flirting_ with me and making me _like you_ even though you told me that you like another girl? Is THAT what you never meant to do?!”

“No!” Adrien cringed. God, this was all so wrong…. “I didn’t want to hurt you! I didn’t know you liked me, and when I found out- Y-you never talk to me when I’m Adrien. You always get nervous and run away. So when I had to idea to come to you for baking lessons- I just didn’t want to make you uncomfortable and I figured that you had no problems talking to Chat, so-!”

“That’s not an excuse, Adrien!” Marinette cried, looking angrier at his attempts to explain himself. “Look, I’m sorry I’m an idiot who can’t speak to you, but that’s no reason to manipulate me into talking to you the way you did! If it bothered you that much, then you should have asked me about it as yourself! Don’t put on a mask and TRICK someone into talking to you!”

“I didn’t mean to do that though!” Adrien reminded her, thoroughly frustrated. “I just wanted your help. I never meant to find out any of that other stuff, Marinette, and I wasn’t trying to trick you! I meant everything I told you as Chat.”

“Even if you did, it’s still deceiving me when I don’t know it’s you under the mask.” Marinette told him. “I wouldn’t have told you if I’d known the truth. Not when I knew you already liked someone else.”

“I know.” Adrien said, cringing slightly as he met Marinette’s eyes. “I know you didn’t mean to tell me any of that, and I’m sorry that you didn’t get to tell me about your feelings in your terms. That’s why that was the last time I came to your place as Chat. I couldn’t pretend that I didn’t know, or act like knowing that you liked me wasn’t a big deal. I even got Ladybug pretty worried, with how out of it I was. But Marinette, I meant everything I told you as Chat. Including the stuff about how I think you’re amazing. I swear Marinette, it was never my intention to hurt you.” His voice cracked slightly as he repeated the last part, watching with trepidation as Marinette slumped onto a nearby bench and hugged her legs to hide her face in her knees.

“I know that, Adrien. But it doesn’t change the fact you did.” She told him quietly. His heart sank a moment at how broken the girl sounded and he needed a moment to steel himself before he approached her cautiously and began to speak again.

“Marinette. When I came to your house yesterday, it was because there was something I wanted to tell you. And I know you’re upset with me, and I understand why, but I still want to tell you.” Marinette didn’t respond to that, still curled in on herself. She didn’t make any move to encourage him, but didn’t stop him either. “Marinette, the truth is that I like you. I really, really like you. And even if you didn’t mean for me to find out the way I did, I was really happy when you said that you liked me. I wanted us to be together. I understand, if you don’t feel that way anymore after everything that’s happened, but I still want you to know how I feel.” Marinette looked up at that, meeting Adrien’s eyes with her own surprised stare. Hope stirred in Adrien’s chest as Marinette released her legs, unfurling from her ball.

“You like me?” She repeated, sounding as though she couldn’t quite believe it.

“I meant it when I said you were basically the whole package, Princess.” Adrien responded before he could stop himself. A part of his was surprised when he realized what he said, worried that he’d made things worse by using Chat’s nickname when she was so upset with him for the stunt he’d pulled in the catsuit. But oddly enough, it actually seemed to make Marinette relax ever so slightly, though she did give an unladylike snort and pointedly roll her eyes.

Hope flared as it suddenly occurred to the model that even when she was upset with him, Marinette still saw Chat as a friend regardless of the fact that Adrien wasn’t wearing the mask. That he was someone she was comfortable with, which was something that Adrien had never had the pleasure of being. He’d never seen the difference before, but now it was clear as day.

“You also told me not to take that the wrong way.” She reminded him before her eyes hardened slightly. “AND you asked for my help to teach you how to bake for your amazing girlfriend, remember?” Adrien started a bit at that. Girlfriend?! Marinette thought-?!

“She’s not my girlfriend, Marinette.” Adrien confessed quickly. “She’s…” _Don’t_ say Ladybug. Bringing Ladybug’s name into the conversation when Marinette obviously had issues with her self-esteem was a really, REALLY bad idea. “…she’s a girl I work with. And yeah, I like her, but she never saw me as anything more than a friend. And once I found out that you like me and realized that I like you too, I figured that I should move on and stop pining over someone who didn’t want me that way.”

“And you expect me to believe that you could just turn off how you feel for this girl because of me? Just like that?” Marinette demanded, frowning a little. Adrien winced. Apparently, it didn’t matter whether or not she knew that it was Ladybug who had first captured his heart, because Marinette felt overshadowed by the girl either way.

“No, I can’t. I’m probably always going to love her, because she’s amazing and strong and compassionate. But I feel the same way about you, Marinette.”

“Do you?” Marinette asked, looking pained. “You really expect me to believe for one minute that you’re not going to regret just giving up this girl for someone like me? Because it sounds to me like you still like her, and you’re just settling on me as the consolation prize because you’re too afraid to actually ask her out.”

“That’s not true!” Adrien insisted, a little hurt that Marinette would think such a thing of him, and of herself.

“Yes it is. And you’re going to spend your whole life regretting it and hating me because I’m not her, and I’ll never be her. I’m just Marinette.”

“Marinette, that’s NOT true!” Adrien was starting to feel angry now, frustrated that the girl wouldn’t just _listen_ to him. Maybe she wasn’t a superhero, but Marinette was still incredible and he’d never change anything about her. There was nothing to change in his opinion. She was beautiful and kind and strong, and she didn’t exist on some pedestal in the sky that he had no hope of ever reaching. She goofed off with him, and listened to his problems, and reassured him when he was down. He loved her, and he wanted her to love him back. He had a feeling that she might, even now.

Except she was too afraid to actually admit it.

“I don’t want to hold you back, Adrien. And I don’t want to spend all my time with you afraid that you’re comparing me to someone else.” Marinette told him, standing up and staring down at her feet. “I think maybe you shouldn’t approach me anymore. Maybe it’ll be better if we just go our separate ways.”

“That’s not going to solve anything!” Adrien protested, dragging a hand through his hair in frustration. “Marinette-!” Before he could argue with the girl any further, an explosion drew their attention North, both teens tensing at the familiar sounds of screams and maniacal laugher.

Akuma. Of course an Akuma would attack right at that very moment.

“You better go, Adrien.” Marinette told him quietly. He pursed his lips, reluctant to leave the girl to fight.

“Stay here.” He half commanded and half begged. “I’ll be back as soon as the fight’s over, just- don’t move okay?!” And with that, he took off running towards the source of the explosion, hoping and praying the entire time that Marinette would still be there when the fight was over and he returned.

Adrien knew that it was a pointless wish, but he had to keep hoping that it’d be true. Otherwise he might not make it through this fight in one piece.


	12. In Which Things Go Completely to Pot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: GRAPHIC DEPICTION OF DROWNING, INSECTS

“Claws out!” Adrien hisses under his breath.  With a flash of green, flowing lightning, Adrien Agreste enters a small copse and exits as Chat Noir before leaping to the roof of the nearest building and disappearing.

Marinette watches him go as people begin to stream past her, running sensibly away from the source of the maniacal laughter.  She folds her arms across her chest as Tikki pokes their head out from the purse.

“Marinette,” Tikki whispers as loudly as they dare.

“I know, I know,” Marinette says.  She glances around her as the stream of terrified people slows to a trickle and strolls as nonchalantly as she can into the same copse.  She takes a moment to look around her one more time---the last few remaining people in the park, with the exception of Alya, sprinting full-tilt down the dirt path with Nino trailing behind, shouting for her to slow down, are more interested in leaving as quickly as possible than they are at looking at this one random schoolgirl---before she opens her purse.

“Tikki, spots on.”

* * *

The fight isn’t going well when she arrives.

“Do you honestly bee-lieve,” some loon in a yellow-and-black striped unitard and a hexagonal veiled hat howls from atop a cloud of buzzing, humming bullet-bodied bees, “that you could pose a threat to me, you mange-riddled cat?  Me?  The _Beekeeper_?”

Chat doesn’t respond to the repartee, but stands in a low crouch, snarling, his knuckles crackling audibly as they tighten around his staff.  Around him lie a dozen abandoned cars, either partly or completely submerged in enormous blobs of honey setting like amber around them.

Okay, not completely abandoned.  She turns away with a slight shudder from the sight of a silhouette within one of the vehicles, the door half-open.  She can just barely make out the vague, blank expression on the face of the girl within---

She forces the image out of her mind.  Nightmares later, fight _now._ Win and save them retroactively.

Chat dodges behind a truck as a glob of honey sails towards him then darts back as a second ballistic honey blob slams into the side and overbalances the trailer, sending the entire truck crashing sideways with a groan of overstressed metal.  His snarl redoubles as he whirls his staff in front of him in a defensive screen and succeeds only in getting his weapon spun out of his hand as a third glob of honey impacts it.

“Chat!” she shouts as he leaps backwards, dodging a flurry of head-sized spheres of honey that _splort_ wetly into the asphalt and smash through a storefront window.  He skids to a halt beside her.

“Need to get into an open space,” she tells him as the Beekeeper shouts something else, the words incomprehensible with distance.  “This street is a shooting gallery---”

Chat hits her at waist height and bears her to the ground as a fist of buzzing bee bodies whirs by overhead, so closely that the beat of their wings tosses up dirt and dust into their faces.

“Right,” she says, spitting out grit as they roll off to the side and spring to their feet, dodging the blob of honey that _splats_ into the street.  “Case in point.  Retreat towards the park---”

“No,“ Chat spits, with a violence so sudden and vehement that it surprises even him, his face going pale for a second.  They split apart before Ladybug can offer a reply, the Beekeeper’s wild laughter following them as he scythes---she squints in the beat between a stop and a leap, and yes, he has a honey wand in his hand---back and forth, sending globules of sticky honey spraying like fist-sized birdshot across the width of the street.  The barrage forces Chat into the meager cover of a doorway; a hail of bees forces him out again a second later.

“Chat,” Ladybug shouts as they pass each other in the street.  “Come on!  At this rate we’ll be pinned down---whoa!”

A spinning bola of honey whips towards her at head-height as a carpet of bees swoops towards her legs.  She moves on instinct, hurling herself forwards in a low roll between above the stinging mass of insects and below the choking, saccharine gloop.

“Chat, come on, move!” she screams at him as she tackles him into the cover of a honey-covered car.  She points back behind them, towards the park.  “Move, move, move!” she repeats.

“No,” Chat replies after a beat.

“What?” is all that Ladybug is able to get out as she meets his unexpected resistance again like a skydiver running face-first into a brick wall---he saw reason quickly enough, usually.

They glance up at a sudden noise, and she plants both feet on his chest and kicks them apart from each other as a flying mass of bees splashes down upon them in a furiously humming hammer of living bodies.

She curses under her breath.  Damn his irrational hide, she was just going to need to do this the hard way then.

“Lucky Charm!”

There’s a flash of pink light and an odd contraption lands in her hands.  She stops to study it out of sheer bafflement---an odd bellows-like thing riveted to the side of what to all appearances was a giant tin mug with a spout---and immediately regrets her decision as a swarm of humming bodies catches up to and engulfs her, forcing her to leap blindly upwards out of the cloud or else choke on insects as bees fill her mouth and nostrils.

The Beekeeper is expecting the move.

As Ladybug reaches the apex of her jump he whips his honey wand around, spraying a fine hail of marble-sized drops of honey out at her.  She flinches, her arms going up before her in a defensive cross and feels the honey splash coolly across her unprotected torso and arms and across her cheeks.  After a second she feels it shrink and harden, like hot-melt adhesive beading on skin.

That just couldn’t be good.

It isn’t.  She hits the ground, rolls, and nearly pulls her right arm out of its socket when it sticks to the asphalt while the rest of her body fails to get the message and continues forwards.  Only a quick half-roll to the side and a moment’s frantic flailing keeps her legs from getting glommed down as well.

“Chat!” she screams.

“On it, my Lady!” Chat shouts back.  A moment’s vicious anger---he claimed to hold Marinette dearer to him than Ladybug and yet here he was, _still_ with the pet names---gets drowned under a tide of relief as he wrenches his staff free from a bead of entrapping honey and leaps to the attack, climbing nimbly up the buildings to either side of them, dodging globules of honey that seek to gum a hand or a foot or a leg to the brickwork.

A cloud of bees slams into him and takes his balance maybe fifteen seconds later, but it’s given her the time she needs to get free.

Ladybug curls herself up and rolls up and over her trapped arm so that she’s squatting with her right arm between her planted feet, then in one smooth motion wrenches upwards with every muscle in her body.  The asphalt gives as Chat falls from the building and _thumps_ into the ground with a loud curse.

Right, she thinks as she brushes debris from her arm.  Lucky Charm, Lucky Charm, where is the Lucky Charm.  She’d dropped it when her arm got stuck, and it’d rattled forwards, but then she’d kicked it at some point.

She spots it just as the Beekeeper does, and the buzzing cloud of bees circles back around as it plunges towards Chat and swoops instead towards her.

 _Nuts_.  She lunges forwards and snatches the Lucky Charm up, ducking her head desperately as brown-and-yellow-bodied insects slam into her and tangle in her hair, then rolls again, crushing dozens of bees against the street.  The Beekeeper screams wordlessly in rage and withdraws the stinging cloud from her to swing his honey wand wildly at the ground, creating a minefield of marble-sized beads of honey all around her.

“Hive got a special place in hell for _you_ when today’s business is done, traitor,” the Beekeeper spits at her, his voice a waspish buzz, before he swings the wand down one last time.

It makes a sound that could roughly be approximated as _phlut._

He blinks at it as Ladybug smirks at him and tries to swing it again.  No sound is forthcoming this time, but a tiny droplet of honey gathers on the end before dropping to the ground.

“Thought so,” Ladybug says.  “I was noticing that the amount of honey you were slinging around was getting less and less over time.  And now you’ve just got your bees---”

The Beekeeper snarls and points with the wand.  The bees swarming aimlessly around him gather, the hum of their wings redoubling into the growling of lightning in a storm cloud, before they shoot towards her in a single, furious spear.  Ladybug stands her ground.

“---and I think I know what this is,” she concludes.

She points the spout towards the incoming bees and starts pumping the bellows furiously, smoke spewing forth in a choking haze.  She flinches, her eyelids slamming shut, her face automatically turning from the fury of the swarm as the tip of the lance punches through the cloud and slams into her, pushing her feet back a few centimeters as what must be hundreds of millions of bee bodies slam into her with unrelenting force.  She keeps pumping as the wind shifts and blows the acrid tang of smoke towards her.

After a few seconds, she opens her eyes.

The previously vicious swarm hums placidly before and all around her---and what must be several thousand clinging onto her, that she quickly shakes off and nudges gently to the side---in a meters-long oblong carpet of bee bodies thinking calm bee thoughts, stripped of the Beekeeper’s malign will.

“What?” the Beekeeper says.  “Get her!”  He jabs forwards with the wand.

Ladybug flinches a little as a portion of the mass of bees rises up, but relaxes as it settles back down.  He thrusts the honey wand forwards again, and a mass of the bees hums up into a rough sphere and stays there, buzzing aimlessly in midair, but does nothing more.

“I read about it in a magazine once,” Ladybug taunts as she hops neatly over the humming carpet of bees.  A loud beep echoes through the street.  “They aren’t interested in fighting anyone anymore.  They’re just interested in feeding and making honey now.”

A slow grin spreads across the Beekeeper’s face, wide and toothy enough that Ladybug has no issue seeing the malicious glee in it even from ten meters below him.

“Thank you,” the Beekeeper says, “for reminding me.”

The low thrum of bee wings suddenly increases to a roar even as the Beekeeper starts to drift gently towards the ground, his smile unmoving, his living flying carpet dispersing in tufts and clumps.  After a few seconds of that unnerving smile Ladybug turns, keeping him in her peripheral vision.

Behind her, the bees rise in a sluggish wave of bodies and surge down along the street, ignoring Chat, who stares at them with a wide-eyed look of horrified fascination as they flow past.

Ladybug shrugs as she turns back to face the Beekeeper.  “Okay,” she says.  “So what?”

“So they’ll be _back_ ,” he spits as his boots touch ground, his smile turning ugly for a second.  “And you’ll all be sorry that you ever crossed---”

“Yadda yadda, Miraculous Stones, yadda,” she interrupts.  “But in the meantime you’ve just deprived yourself of your last weapon while the both of us are still here and still armed.”

Still with that unnerving smile, she reflects.

“Wrong, little bug,” the Beekeeper says, holding up a finger.  “One, it’s just you.”

Ladybug puts it together as she picks up on the sound of running footsteps.  She turns sharply.

“Chat!” she shouts at his retreating back.  “Where the hell are you---oh, forget it.”

She turns back as the swarm continues to flow away.  “I don’t need his help to take that wand from you.”

As she starts to stalk towards him she frowns briefly at his two upraised fingers, held up in a victory “V”.

“Two,” he says.  “You didn’t smoke all my little friends.”

Ladybug catches on just in time to leap out of the way of the twin streams of bees as they converge on her.

“You are _not_ getting away---” she begins, but is forced to break off as the mini-swarm, far reduced in numbers from the sun-blotting cloud that he’d first attacked with but lethal enough with their numbers, pursues her, lashing out again and again like a whip.

Under the unrelenting buzzing barrage, and hounded by the Beekeeper’s laughter, she’s driven back, step-by-step, towards the park.

If Chat hadn’t freaking cut and run all of a sudden, she thinks furiously as she rolls aside from a swooping charge by the bees, then this _bullshit_ would be over with already.  He was _not_ racking up the brownie points today.

Why had he just run, anyways? some part of her brain not preoccupied with avoiding both the octopus-like aerial bee monster that the mini-swarm had formed and the peacefully feeding swarms covering everything with a stamen in the park muses.  Chat wasn’t a coward---whoops, watch out to make sure you don’t trip over that planter---in fact he was as close to being a blood knight as you could get in their job.  Maybe he’d used Cataclysm---left left leftleft _left_ \---early on to get himself free of the clinging honey, but she hadn’t heard the incessant beeping that would warn the both of them that his time was ticking down, and besides, he was usually good about calling out when he needed to leave.  But then again he was being ~~incredibly annoying~~ odd right now---

Three things happen simultaneously.  First the bottom drops out of her stomach as several little facts clank together and the little cogwheels start whirring in her head.  Second, she feels the sudden, familiar lethargy, the slow indrawing of power from her limbs like the moment before an involuntary gasp, when all the air in her lungs has been spent and there are still meters of water above her, crushing her down, taunting her with sunlight and clean air above, the lethargy that signals the inevitable and since she’s being chased by a horde of what might definitely be called _killer_ bees the potentially lethal withdrawal of her powers as Ladybug.

Third, every single bee in the park suddenly takes flight, their wings a sudden roaring hum as they crash down upon her.

There’s enough time for her to worry about whether anyone is watching, and then the bees are upon her and animal panic takes over.

 _I’m Ladybug I’m Ladybug I’m Ladybug_ , she repeats to herself as whirring screens of bees blot out the sun, plunging her into noisy darkness.  _i’m Ladybug i’m Ladybug i’m Ladybug_ as she attempts to escape the cocoon of flying bodies but only succeeds in blinding herself further as she runs into them, bees clinging to her eyelids, crawling over her nose, forcing her to clamp her lips shut over her teeth to stop the scream, forcing her hands over nose and mouth both to screen away the insects so that she has room enough to breathe without inhaling bees as well.  _im ladybug im ladybug im ladybug_ as her transformation gives one final beep and flashes pink, briefly illuminating the inside of the swarm before even that light is swallowed up as though it had never existed and the weight of the insects crawling upon her bears her to the ground, curled into a fetal crouch.  _imladybugimladybugimladybugimladybug---_

Abruptly, the bees dart away from her in every direction and Marinette is left gasping and shuddering, curled into a panicked defensive ball, miraculously sting-free.

The lack of insects is little enough comfort when, a breath later, an enormous ballistic glob of honey swoops from the sky and smashes her to the ground.

The world goes dark amber as Marinette stares, eyes wide and unblinking and stinging, her tears pooling before her eyes rather than dripping away from them.  She fights to keep from drawing breath on sheer instinct---breathing honey would not be a good idea, it would _not_ be a good idea---and tries to stand, but the honey around her is as thick as tar and hardening by the second, crystallizing into a solid, rigid mass

~~_the girl her face blank all terror all pain erased just_ ~~

no, no she is not going to die here, she is not going to die she’s not going to die not going to die not goingtodienotdienotdienotdie

 ~~ _it m_~~ _u_ ~~ _st’ve_~~ _hurt_ ~~ _at least at first_~~ _and then_ ~~ _the cleansing_~~ _dark must’ve taken her_

Marinette tries to fight down the animal terror and fails, but the terror roots in her and suddenly there are reserves of strength that she’d never found before and she stands, slowly, her muscles screaming with the strain.

The Beekeeper appears from the treeline, wand held at the ready as his bees swarm about his feet and ankles.  Slowly, he rises into the air, his gaze panning across the park, focusing on her as his face creases with a frown for a second but then continuing on.

“I could’ve sworn,” he mutters, his voice reverberating through his bees, the honey vibrating in sympathy so that Marinette hears every word as clearly as though he was a mere hairsbreadth away as she claws a hand upwards, black spots popping in her vision, knives piercing her chest.  “Oh well.”

The Beekeeper turns to leave.

“Marinette!” Chat screams.

His voice powers through the muffling, choking honey with sheer terrified volume, the syllables of her name ragged and saw-edged.  She fights to turn her head and just catches sight of him as he sprints towards her, his outline weirdly distorted by the tears and the honey.

“Marinette!” he screams again.

The Beekeeper blindsides him with a double swipe of his honey wand.  First a honey bola traps an arm to a side, and as Chat stumbles, his balance taken, a larger blob slams into him and hurls him against a tree, trapping his torso and both arms at an awkward angle against the trunk.

It’s getting hard to see through the red-pulsing darkness creeping in at the corners of her vision, but she can still make out Chat, struggling to tear himself free from the entrapping goo.

“Don’t bother,” the Beekeeper hums with a little chuckle.  “If I could hold a lorry in place with this, you don’t stand a chance, you brute.”

Chat pays no attention to him but stares instead at Marinette as she continues to try to fight her way clear.

His mouth frames a word.  One word, four syllables, said softly enough that the thrum of blood in her ears drowns it out.

His entire form erupts into a fury of glowing black motes, and in a flurry of inverted firefly sparks Chat tears himself free from the honey as it disintegrates, losing its rigidity and dripping away in shreds and threads.

Oh, Marinette thinks as sensation starts to fade completely and the urge to just open her mouth and inhale---one nice lungful of choking muck ~~and it’ll all be over~~ \---overwhelms everything.  At least Adrien’s free.

She lets her eyes close.

A second later she’s awake, her lungs in a constant spasm as she coughs out bits of honey, her face on fire, her eyelids still glued shut but she can register the feeling of wind, clean, free air on her face and part of a hand and the feel of a desperately hammering heartbeat in tandem with hers.

Chat must’ve torn her free.  Chat must---somehow---have _torn her free._ He’d come through.

There’s a familiar lurch and a feeling of weightlessness before they hit cool water.  Marinette nearly sucks in a breath in reaction before her head surfaces and Chat paddles them along with a gentle current, ducking her with every other stroke---but oh, how welcome the feel of water is, even it if is going up her nose.  They must be in the Seine.

After a minute, as the water laps at her face and dissolves the honey binding her eyes closed, she risks a glance around her.

Shade, and a familiar black-clad arm wrapped around her chest and beneath her arms as Chat pulls the two of them into a shadowed alcove.  No bees.  Some---well, a lot---of honey, caked on her arms and legs and oozing into some rather uncomfortable spots.  A peek of Tikki, little more than a red blur, as the little kwami zips into her purse.

Chat pulls her more fully into the alcove as a squadron of bees drones by overhead, the Beekeeper’s furious screaming following them.

“I don’t think he noticed us going in the river,” he says after a moment.  “I think we’re safe.”

Marinette says nothing, but moves an arm and secures a firmer hold on his arm as she breathes in, still dizzy from her near-drowning.  Chat holds her a little tighter to himself.

After a little while, as his ring ticks down to three pads, she feels his chest shake beneath her.

“I’m sorry,” he says, his voice a bare whisper as he fights back sobs, “I’m sorry, god I’m sorry.  I just fuck everything up, don’t I?  I just fuck it all up, I’m sorry, Marinette, I shouldn’t have gotten involved with you, I’m sorry.”

“Wasn’t your fault,” Marinette says, her voice raspy.  “Adrien, stop that, it wasn’t your fault.”

“I asked you to stay,” he says.  “How is it not my fault?”

She feels a tight sting of hurt---how stupid did he really think she was? did he really think that she’d just stand around mooning about while he gallivanted off, that she’d stay there even as someone clearly not friendly to the random bystander e.g. her attacked?---but fights the accompanying response down.

“Oh, shut up,” she says tiredly.  “Look, guilt later, fight now.  Get out of here and keep that guy busy---”

“I’m not leaving you aga---”

“Yes, you are,” Marinette says firmly.  “Unless you want to deal with dozens more people like me.”

It’s a low blow, but it gets Chat moving.  After a moment’s stiffness Chat tugs her back until she can secure a handhold herself, then edges himself out into the current.

“Stay safe, Princess,” he says, treading water, his eyes pleading.  Then he dives below the surface and swims swiftly away, looking for all the world like a particularly large dark-bodied fish.

Marinette watches him go, then turns away.  She feels gingerly at the lines of fire across her face and finds fine, shallow cuts running down her cheeks.  Chat must’ve had to claw to get the honey off of her face.

Okay, no more slacking.  She opens her purse with her free hand.

“Hey, Tikki,” she says, her voice weirdly echoey to her own hearing.  It must be the remains of the honey still blocking her ears.  “Emergency cookies are soaked, obviously.  Are you good or do we need to go home?”

Tikki chokes down a last crumb of soggy, disintegrating cookie.  “We’re good, Marinette,” the kwami says.

“Right.  Spots on.”

The fight goes more smoothly this time, and the Beekeeper is down and the akuma purified in no time at all.  Marinette forgoes the usual offer of a fist-bump and swings away home, thoughts whirling, head and chest aching, to fall into the worried embrace of her parents, and then a warm bath, and then bed.

* * *

Plagg swats another akuma from the air, pinning it to the windowsill with a paw.  The kwami cocks their head to the side, studying it for a moment as it struggles and flaps weakly.  Then, with a hint of resignation, they grab its body and a wing in its paws, raise it to their mouth, and take a bite out of the other wing.

Plagg makes a face as the akuma’s struggling redoubles and downs the rest of it with two swift gulps.  Their stomach gurgles uncomfortably as the dark, burning energy seethes against ethereal flesh, until their own power floods over it and subsumes the remains of the akuma.

Plagg shoots a glance back at their Chosen and flies over to the bathroom to wash the taste out of their mouth.

This was getting out of hand.  This entire bloody mess was getting well out of hand, and the spirit was not going to be able to keep—the eldritch contents of their stomach roil again for an uncomfortable few seconds—doing this indefinitely.

Plagg looks back at their Chosen, his face buried into his pillows as he lies prone on his bed.  Right.

This wasn’t going to be fun, but it was necessary.

Plagg zips through the window.  Five minutes’ flying, mostly spent dodging bastard seagulls, takes them to Marinette’s home, the skylight cracked open to admit the cool Parisian night.

Tikki whirs out and intercepts them before they can enter.

“Plagg,” Tikki says.

“Tikki,” Plagg says with a wink.  “Hey babe.”

“What,” Tikki says.

“No need to be so hostile—”

“You agreed,” Tikki says, the kwami’s tone flat and unamused.  “ _We_ agreed.  Not until they were older.  Not until they were ready.”

“I think they’re pretty ready as it is,” Plagg counters.  “They’re the best ones we’ve gotten in a while.”

“That’s not the issue,” Tikki says.  “The issue is whether they’re—”

“Good enough, yeah, yeah,” Plagg says, waving a paw dismissively.  “I’ll vouch for the kid.”

“You always vouch for them,” Tikki sighs.  “What’s this really about?”

“Straight to business, Tikki?  You never let us give pleasure a—”

“Plagg,” Tikki growls.

“All right, all right.”  Plagg’s expression loses all joviality.  “He’s been watching that video that news site put up of Marinette getting trapped over and over again, typical guilt-trip nonsense. The kid’s hurting.”

“So’s Marinette,” Tikki says.

“Akuma bad?”

“Yes.”

Plagg groans, bringing up both paws to their face and dragging them down in the manner of someone for whom becoming drunk enough to buy a plane ticket, board a plane, take the flight to another continent altogether, get off of the plane, pass out in a gutter, and wake up the following morning with a hangover to end all hangovers and no recollection of the entire odyssey is rapidly becoming the most attractive option.  “We need to get them together and get this over with.  Fast.”

“ _No reveals,”_ Tikki says quickly.  “It’s bad enough that Marinette knows who Chat is and I doubt that it’d work anyways.  This isn’t an issue of them pining after each other, not anymore.”

“Look,” Plagg says after a pause.  “Can you please just get Marinette to talk to him?  He wants to make this work.”

“It isn’t a matter of whether he wants to make it work,” Tikki says, “it’s a matter of whether it can.”

There’s a brief moment where Plagg looks at their compatriot.

“Okay, okay,” Tikki says, holding up their paws in surrender.  “Probably not for a couple days, it’s still pretty raw, but I’ll talk to her.  But you need to make Adrien understand just how much he’s hurt her.”

“Fantastic.”  Plagg zips over and gives Tikki a brief hug.  “See you later, Tikki.”


	13. In Which There is Resolution

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this one took so long, but I'm afraid my life took a hectic turn in the last month. For those of you who don't follow me on tumblr, my family's dog died in an accident in early August, and we had about half the employees at my place of work walk out on us without putting in their two weeks, leaving me and a few of my co-workers to pick up the slack.
> 
> Things are improving now though, and I'm grateful for everyone's patience while I was dealing with the mess I call a life. Here's hoping that the new chapter will live up to your expectations! ^^
> 
> <3 Loosey

_My fault. My fault. All my fault._

 

Those words echoed through Adrien’s head as he played the newsfeed video on his monitor over and over again, watching Marinette struggle as the honey hardened around her. It was like a bad song. Or a death sentence. It was his fault that Marinette had been in danger. His fault that she has almost died, frozen with that look of horror and fear on her face, trapped and helpless and-

 

_My fault. Mine. All mine._

 

What if he’d been a few minutes slower? What if the Akuma had managed to trap Ladybug while he was worrying about Marinette because he wasn’t there to do his job and protect her until she managed to free the cursed insect and turn everything to normal again? He’s almost lost both of the girls he cared about because he couldn’t focus when he was supposed to. Marinette nearly died because of him.

 

_My fault. All my fault. All-_

 

“Alright, enough is enough.”

 

That was all the warning Adrien got before all four of his monitors went black. Startled, the blond crouched underneath his desk, where his Kwami’s irritated voice had originated from, eyes widening when he realized that the small God had chewed clean through his cable, leaving severed wires in his wake.

 

“Plagg!” Adrien said, frowning at the tiny green-eyed being in anger. “What gives?”

 

“You obviously weren’t about to stop torturing yourself anytime soon, so I figured I’d do us both a favor and do it for you.” Plagg sniffed back, flying past the human to settled cross legged on the back of his chair. “Now will you stop moping?”

 

Adrien glared at the cat irritably in response before sweeping past to fall on his bed in a sulky huff.

 

“Your Princess is alive, kid.” Plagg reminded the broody teen. “So stop beating yourself up.”

 

“She shouldn’t have been in danger in the first place.” Adrien mumbled into his pillow.

 

“In a perfect world no one would be in any danger.” The Kwami shot back in a rare fit of wisdom. “Unfortunately, you humans like to make a mess of things.”

 

“She was so scared, Plagg.” Adrien said, his voice small. “And I was too. I thought I was going to lose her.”

 

“People get scared. People get hurt. That’s what happens when you’re fighting against evil sociopaths who don’t care who they have to step on to get what they want.” Plagg informed him bluntly. “Which is why you were chosen to receive a Miraculous. To protect them. Just like you promised Ladybug that you would when you guys fought Stoneheart together. And you’ve never failed to do that, Adrien. You’ve always been good at getting up and getting back out there, even after taking hard hits. The virtue of being hardheaded, I guess.”

 

"…Where did you even hear the word sociopath, anyways? Have you been reading my psychology books again?” Adrien wondered, lifting his head just enough to give the small cat a small, almost nonexistent smile.

 

“I get bored. I need something to do while you’re busy mooning over girls.” Plagg snipped back. “Now stop worrying about my reading habits and just fix this mess already.”

 

“I don’t know how to fix something like this though.” Adrien admitted softly. “Even ignoring the fact that I nearly got Marinette killed- which is kind of really hard to do- things are still completely messed up. She doesn’t think I care about her, Plagg. She thinks she’s some kind of runner up and the only reason I want to be with her is because it’s easier than chasing Ladybug around trying to get her to like me.”

 

“Yeah, because she’s really making things easy on the both of you.” Plagg scoffed.

 

“I’m the one who made her confess to me without knowing it.” Adrien reminded the Kwami with a guilty frown.

 

“Okay, so let’s skip the part where I remind you that I told you getting chummy with your friends as your alter ego was a bad idea and you realize that tiny mortal minds such as yourself ought to listen to us wise and noble Kwami when we give you advice. You can’t change what happened kid. You found out about her feelings for you, and she found out that you’re Chat Noir. All you can do is try and decide where you want to move on from here, and what you’ll do to get there.”

 

Where he wanted to be? Adrien frowned as he considered that, rolling over to stare up thoughtfully at his ceiling. Unbidden, memories flashed through his mind of him and Marinette side by side, giggling and joking over fresh baked pastries. Of before that with video games and hanging out when her uncle came to visit and photos in the park with his friends. The first time in years he, a professional model, had actually had fun getting his picture taken, and she was the driving force behind it. A smile warmed his face as he sat up, more certain than he ever was before.

 

“I want to be with her.” Adrien decided. “I want to be her friend. I want to be more than that. I just… being around her feels right. Like finding your way home.”

 

“Do you HAVE to get all sappy about it?” Plagg complained with an exaggerated roll of the eyes before sighing. “Okay, so you know how you feel, and you know how she feels. So all you have to do is talk to and make her understand how you feel.”

 

“I tried that.” Adrien reminded his Kwami, frustration tinting his tone. “She didn’t listen to me.”

 

“Well then I guess that’s that then huh?” Plagg said airily.

 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Adrien demanded, glaring at the floating cat.

 

“It means that if you’re really gonna just lie there and accept that there’s nothing you can do to convince your Princess that you’re serious about her, then it’s game over.” Plagg shrugged.

 

“I’m _not_ just accepting it. I’m just saying that I can’t think of a way to make her believe that I’m not just settling for her because I can’t have Ladybug.” Adrien insisted, determination glinting in his eyes. Plagg almost smirked at how easy it was to stir up Adrien’s stubborn nature, but forced their expression to remain bored and aloof. It took a lot of effort to keep Adrien convinced that they were indifferent about his relationship with the pig-tailed girl, and it wouldn’t do to ruin that now.

 

“Well that’s easy, just do what someone would have to do to convince you that they liked you because you’re Adrien, and not because you’re rich and famous and a freaking supermodel.” Plagg suggested. Adrien frowned.

 

What someone would have to do for him to be convinced that they liked him?

 

“That’s… actually probably not very hard to do, honestly.” Adrien admitted, only somewhat sheepish. He knew better than anyone that he was desperately lonely and starved for affection, no thanks to his upbringing. He had a habit of clinging to anyone and everyone who gave him any sort of positive attention, since he was so unused to seeing it at home.

 

Plagg leveled an unimpressed look at him before sighing heavily.

 

“Alright then. So what makes Marinette different from girls like Chloe or Lila? THEY aren’t shy about the fact they’d like to date you, after all, but you didn’t ditch your little one-sided escapade with Ladybug to go running to them even though you consider them your friends.” Which, now that Plagg thought about it, really DID prove the point that Adrien had the bar set way too low as far as his acceptance of others went.

 

“Marinette’s just… well, she’s Marinette.” Adrien said by way of explanation. “I mean, I still can’t believe she likes me. She’s so cool, and amazing and she’s smart and-!” Adrien inhaled sharply, eyes widening as inspiration struck. Springing from his bed, Adrien ran over to his desk, nearly knocking Plagg out of the air as in his haste.

 

“Hey!” The kwami yelped, scowling at their chosen before curiously flying over to peer over his shoulder as he began furiously working on a piece of paper. It only took a few moments for Plagg to realize what the boy was doing and once they did, a wide grin stretched across their face in approval.

 

 _There’s a good kid._ Plagg thought encouragingly before floating off to his camembert.

 

If anything could fix this, then this could.

 

* * *

 

 

In the months she’d been Ladybug, there had only been a handful of Akuma that had been bad enough to give her nightmares.

 

Stoneheart had been the first naturally, inspiring horrific visions of running from the angry giant as Marinette while dark butterflies destroyed everything they touched and caused her loved ones to vanish one at a time before her eyes, helpless and unable to escape the terrifying creature that was chasing her. Timebreaker, the Pharaoh, Darkblade and Volpina all had the dubious honors of causing Marinette to wake up screaming in a cold sweat as well, haunted by memories of Chat fading in her arms, of almost losing Alya to that dark vortex, or of failing to protect her friends and watching helplessly while Chat was cut down by medieval knights.

 

Volpina had been the worst so far though, bringing with her night terrors of Adrien being thrown from the Eiffel Tower for real. Of cradling his dead body as the fox villainess’ laugh rang loudly in her ears. It always took her ages to calm back down after one of those dreams, even with Tikki’s expertise at soothing her back to sleep.

 

But after a solid week of waking up halfway through yet another dream of drowning in honey, Beekeeper had started to give the faux fox a run for her money.

 

Practically expecting it by now, Tikki was quick to act, flitting over to their Chosen to look her directly in the eye and began to glow brighter with the soothing magic of the Ladybug Kwami, then letting the light fade and flare up again in a slow and steady rhythm.

 

“It’s okay, Marinette. Just focus on breathing. It’s going to be okay. I’m right here, and you’re safe. You’re in your bed, and there’s nothing here that can hurt you. Just keep breathing in and out.” Tikki instructed quietly and calmly.

 

Marinette’s eyes were drawn to the kwami, the only light in the otherwise pitch black room, and after a few moments she found herself matching her breathing to the rhythm that the kwami set with their glow. Her trembling slowly subsided and the tears slowed to a stop as she got her breathing under control.

 

“There! That’s wonderful, Marinette!” Tikki beamed at her in approval, floating closer to hug the girl’s cheek affectionately.

 

“Thanks you Tikki.” Marinette said with a weak smile. “I’d be sunk without you.”

 

“Don’t mention it, Marinette. You know that I’ll be here for you whenever you need me.” The kwami assured their chosen with a gentle smile while giving her a soft pat on the cheek, ignoring the small stirring of guilt felt upon hearing the teenager’s gratitude.

 

Marinette wouldn’t be dealing with any of this if it wasn’t for being a Miraculous Chosen, after all. The young human took so much upon herself to protect Paris because it was needed, and that weight sat heavy on Marinette’s small shoulders. True, Marinette wasn’t the youngest chosen Ladybug- not by far- but in Tikki’s immortal eyes they were all children playing dress up who were fighting a war they were never fully prepared to win. Comfort, guidance, and companionship were a meager offering compared to the sacrifices expected to be made by heroes, and yet for many that was more than enough to satisfy them.

 

Which was why Tikki was so determined to do anything to protect them.

 

“Was it the same dream?” Tikki asked quietly, hoping that it was okay to talk about what had set Marinette off now that she was calm again. Biting her lip, Marinette gave a shot, jerky nod in confirmation, making the tiny immortal sigh. “Oh, Marinette…”

 

“I don’t know why I’m letting it bother me so much. I’ve been in bad spots before, and Ch-“ Marinette stopped short, cringing slightly before continuing, “…and I was saved. I’m okay.”

 

“Surviving isn’t the same as being okay, Marinette. You’re not weak for needing time to heal from what happened to you. A lot’s been going on lately, after all.”

 

“That’s an understatement.” Marinette snorted, falling back to rest against her cat shaped body pillow. The sight of its feline face made her frown, the echoes of her dream fading as she turned in the other direction and her mind once more settled on the revelation that had been plaguing her for over a week now.

 

Adrien Agreste was Chat Noir.

 

Her shy, sheltered classmate and the goofball pun cracker who drove her crazy while at the same time inspiring fond affection. The gentle, kind blond whom she had for so long admired from afar and the partner who had once made himself sick from trying to eat three dozen cupcakes in an attempt to win a competition for Jagged Stone tickets despite the fact that the rock star in question had offered to give the Lucky Duo VIP tickets so Chat didn’t have to put himself (and his stomach) through such an ordeal.

 

Chat had insisted that it was the principal of the matter. Marinette suspected that he just really wanted cupcakes, tickets or no tickets.

 

The memory, which was usually one that could inspire a giggle from Marinette, now made her stomach drop like a stone. She had thought she’d known them- known _him_ so well. Adrien AND Chat. Never in a hundred million years would she have ever expected them to be the same person. Never in a thousand million did she think that either of them would hurt her the way they- the way _he_ had.

 

“Marinette?” Tikki questioned softly, blue eyes big with concern.

 

“I still feel like an idiot, you know.” Marinette admitted to the kwami with a quiet sigh. “I didn’t want Chat to know I was developing a crush on him, so I told him about my feelings for Adrien instead. And now…”

 

“Marinette, you couldn’t have known.”

 

“Of course I could have. I just didn’t see because I’m stupid that way.” Marinette said bitterly, leaning back to stare up at the ceiling. “I bet the girl Adrien’s in love with wouldn’t be like that. She’s probably beautiful and brilliant and perfect in ways that make me look like a total loser in comparison.”

 

“Stop putting yourself down, Marinette.” Tikki scolded with a frown. “You are NOT a loser. You’re young, and you’re learning, but you already command the respect of not only your peers, but your elders as well. You are an amazing girl, Marinette, and anyone who knows you can see that. Including Adrien.”

 

“But Adrien just asked me out because-!”

 

“Marinette, you know Adrien. You know Chat Noir. He’s your partner, and your friend. Do you really think that Chat OR Adrien are the kind of boy who would approach a girl if they didn’t want to commit to her 100%?”

 

“I… I guess not.” Marinette realized, frowning to herself.

 

“You know he’s not like that. He’s loving and honest and kind. He’s not so shallow that he’d turn his attentions to someone else if the girl he actually wanted was unavailable. It’s one of the reasons you fell for him twice.” Tikki smiled a little as Marinette blushed brightly at those sagely words.

 

“I know.” Marinette admitted quietly, biting her lip hesitantly before gathering the courage to prompt her Kwami. “Hey, Tikki?” The small red deity gave an inquiring hum, floating closer as Marinette’s eyes flitted about. “Do you think I have the right to… to miss him? I mean, I still see him in school every day, and we still patrol as Ladybug and Chat Noir, but he doesn’t talk to Marinette anymore. And I know I’m the one who told him that’s what I wanted, but… I just feel like he’s a million miles away now, even when he’s standing right next to me, and I know that it’s all my fault.”

 

“Of course you do. He’s been a big part of your life for a long time now.” Tikki responded, studying Marinette intently. “Do you want to talk to him again?”

 

“No!” Marinette said, eyes wide in panic at the thought before the idea of not talking to Adrien or Chat caused a stabbing pain in her heart that made her wince. “Well, yes… Maybe? I don’t know.”

 

“Take your time figuring it out. Find the words you need him to hear.” Tikki advised her. “He’ll wait for you until you’re ready to say them. I know he will, Marinette.”

 

“What makes you so sure though?” Marinette asked, voice weak with insecurity. “The other girl he likes could wise up and make a move while I’m busy being messed up and confused. If that happens…”

 

“If that happens then we’ll deal with it, same as anything else.” Tikki said. “But I don’t think that will be a problem, though.”

 

“Why not?” Marinette asked, eyebrows furrowing as Tikki flashed her an enigmatic smile.

 

“Because you’re still underestimating just how much he cares about you.”

 

* * *

 

 

Ever since that fateful fight against Beekeeper, school had been sheer torture for Marinette. First there was the VERY publicized attack, which had everyone coming up to her and expressing their concern. Marinette was grateful that her friends cared about her, but she really wished they’d understand that she didn’t WANT to talk about it, and every time someone brought it up it just made her relive the whole awful experience. Then there was Adrien and the awkward, heavy Thing that lingered between them ever since their conversation, which caused an atmosphere of tension not only for the two teens in question, but everyone else in the room too.

 

Marinette could feel the questioning looks everyone in the class would shoot her when she steadfast refused to so much as glance in Adrien’s general direction, and Nino had discreetly asked her if she had wanted to talk to him about whatever was going on between her and the blond, stepping back reluctantly when Marinette assured him it was all under control. Alya had been much more difficult to dodge on the subject, which had led to a whispered fight between the best friends during chemistry and both girls giving each other the silent treatment for the rest of the day’s classes before breaking down and making up after school. Marinette really appreciated her best friend’s unconditional love and support, but sometimes Alya’s dogged aggression could be a little much, especially when there were so many secrets that the blogger couldn’t know about in the mix. Still, she was trying her best to be supportive without overstepping, and Marinette was grateful for the effort.

 

But worst of all, of course, was Chloe.

 

Because Chloe, being the person that she was, managed to hone in on both Marinette’s trauma after the akuma attack and the strange new energy between her and Adrien and gleefully struck at both of these newfound weaknesses with aplomb. Marinette tried not to let it bother her much, but…

 

“ADRIKINS!” the wealthy blonde socialite squealed as she threw herself at the model in an exuberant show of affection. A flinch chased across Marinette’s face as her nerves spiked at the knowledge that her partner had arrived and she hastily buried her head into her sketchbook to avoid looking at him, instead trying to focus on the dress she was designing for her mother’s upcoming birthday. A floor length qi pao with a godet skirt for an elegant combination of traditional charm and modern flair.

 

“Hey Chlo.” Adrien greeted weakly, sounding tired at his friend’s enthusiasm.

 

“Oh Adrikins, wasn’t our little rendezvous yesterday an absolute joy?”

 

“As much of a joy as walking around for four hours watching you try on clothes but not actually buy anything can be, I guess.” Adrien responded, his tone flat and neutral enough that it was impossible to tell if he was being sarcastic or not.

 

“Like it’s my fault that everything is so drab lately.” Chloe sniffed haughtily. “When’s your dad going to unveil the next line, anyways? Maybe then I can finally find something worthy of my time.”

 

“I don’t know. They’re talking about pushing the release of the Fall Line back due to some sort of complications. I don’t know the details, but my dad isn’t happy about it.”

 

“You say that like it’s news, dude.” Nino said dryly as his friend took a seat. “Your old man is ALWAYS unhappy.”

 

“True. But he’s unhappier then usual lately.” Adrien said in a manner that was probably supposed to be joking, but really just sounded more resigned then anything. Marinette frowned a little, chancing a peek at the model’s back to try and gauge his mood. Given that he seemed to be talking to Chloe and Nino, she figured that looking would be safe and wasn’t expecting to lock eyes with the boy.

 

For a second she was caught off guard by how vulnerable and lonely Adrien looked, bringing to mind the afternoon in the rain when she fell in love with him, and the day he opened up to her as Chat about how he wanted desperately to impress his crush. She didn’t like what that look did to her heart and stomach and quickly adverted her eyes to her sketchbook to avoid that gaze and the implications behind it.

 

That’s when movement caught the corner of her eye, making her jerk around in time to catch Sabrina quickly straightening up from where she’d been messing with her classmate’s school bag.

 

“What are you doing?!” Marinette demanded harshly, jumping to her feet as her heart began to pound erratically. Tikki was in that bag, if Sabrina had been rooting around in it and found her kwami-

 

“Nothing!” Sabrina said, doing her best to look innocent as she retreated to Chloe’s side. The blonde gave a giggle as she shared a smirk with her friend that did absolutely nothing to make Marinette feel any less suspicious. Crouching next to her bag, Marinette lifted the flap and put her hand in to root around for whatever petty prank the pair had pulled this time.

 

Her heart stuttered to a stop as her digits sank into a familiar, horrifying stickiness.

 

A loud scream tore from Marinette’s throat as she immediately yanked her hand out of her bag. She didn’t notice as the rest of the class immediately focused all attention on her at the sound, nor did she hear when Chloe and Sabrina began to cackle like a pair of hyenas. She was too engrossed with the terror building up in her at the sight of her honey coated hand to pay any of that any mind.

 

Then the sickly sweet scent hit her nose, causing bile to rise up into her throat as her eyes began to water.

 

Shoving past Chloe and Sabrina, who both shrieked with rage at the contact, Marinette shot out the door like a bullet. Vaguely, she heard the angry shouts of Alya and Nino and a worried cry from Adrien, but she didn’t give any of them a second thought. She wasn’t thinking about anything other than the honey covering her hand, the rest of the world vanishing in her panicked haze of ‘getitoffgetitoffgetitoffGETITOFF-!’

 

She almost dove into the girl’s bathroom, throwing on the faucet and forcing her hand under the scalding hot water in a desperate bid for relief.

 

Ten minutes she stood there, scrubbing at her hands as her skin turned red. It was only when she looked up at the mirror in front of her and saw her face that she realized that she was crying. Puffy, red and tearstained, she looked far from anything resembling a superhero at the moment.

 

 _Why am I such a mess all the time?_ She wondered in heartbroken frustration as she splashed some water on her face to try and clean herself up a bit. Shutting off the tap, Marinette toweled off and tossed the trash, then took a few moments to collect herself.

 

Great and powerful Ladybug, getting worked up over a dumb prank.

 

Shaking her head in an attempt to dislodge that thought, Marinette gave herself another once over in the mirror to make sure she was halfway presentable before she headed back to class. It was probably too late to act like Chloe’s prank hadn’t affected her, given the way she’d run out of the classroom, but if she composed herself enough then maybe she wouldn’t look like a complete disaster when she went back in to face the music.

 

But before she could get much further than closing the bathroom door behind herself, a hand came down on her shoulder and made her jump with a loud, startled yelp before spinning around to confront her assailant.

 

Cringing, Adrien took a few steps back, holding up his hands in a placating gesture.

 

“Sorry! I didn’t mean to scare you!” He told her quickly, biting his lip and looking at the ground. “I know you don’t want to talk to me, but I asked the teacher if I could come after you to make sure you’re okay. What Chloe did back there…”

 

“I’m fine.” Marinette said, the lie surprisingly believable to her ears. “Don’t worry about me.” Looking troubled, Adrien opened his mouth to respond to that, but seemed to lose courage before the words could come out.

 

“Right. Guess we should head back to class then, huh?” He said instead, giving her a weak smile that made Marinette stomach twist with guilt. She watched him walk by her, his tall frame wilted with a defeated sort of posture, and found herself wanted to call out to him. To try and fix whatever it was that had been messed up between them. But she didn’t know how to even begin to start that conversation, and she was afraid that she’d mess up if she went in without a plan. She’d never been good at talking to Adrien. It was like an invisible wall came up every time she saw him, and it scared her to think that it wasn’t just her crush on the other side of that unreachable divide anymore. It was her partner. It was Chat Noir.

 

It was the boy who was cursing in surprise as his bag suddenly tore a seam, spilling papers and books all over the hallway floor.

 

The seamstress in Marinette frowned suspiciously at the now useless bag as Adrien shrugged it off his shoulder and lifted the flap with a thunderous scowl. That kind of split happening so fast just wasn’t natural. Something hat to have intentionally tore it for something like this to happen. ‘Something’ which probably has to do with the black blur that darted from the ruined back to the inside of Adrien’s jacket, near his collar. His kwami, of course. Marinette had never really thought much about the Black Cat Kwami before, but Tikki had mentioned before (with fond exasperation) that he could be a troublemaker.

 

Although the timing of his troublemaking seemed rather peculiar in this instant.

 

Putting her suspicions to the back of her mind, Marinette crouched down to help her classmate gather his fallen things, picking up the phone that had fallen next to her foot and handing it back to him immediately. The model accepted it with a grateful smile and then turned his attention to his tablet, inspecting it for damage. Marinette silently began collecting all his fallen books and papers as he did so, movements automatic and almost mechanical until her eyes found an open notebook, a list printed neatly on the exposed paper.

 

_421.) the way she sticks out her tongue when she’s focused on something entirely._

_422.) the time I burned myself on the oven and she put my finger in her mouth._

_423.) her habit of talking to herself when she thinks no one is around._

_424.) the faces she makes when she doesn’t realize I’m looking at her._

 

And so on and so for it went, covering the front and back of each line with lead. Curiosity overrode any sense of shame Marinette had about rifling through her partner’s personal effects, and so she flipped forward in the notebook until she got to the front cover.

 

Adrien’s books fell to the floor for a second time as she stared, dumbstruck at the words emblazed across the top of the front page.

 

The sound made Adrien look up from the tiny chip he’d been inspecting on the corner of his tablet screen and his eyes widened in horror, face going white for a brief second before color flooded it with a vigor, turning him brilliantly red.

 

“WAIT!” Adrien yelped, jumping up and staring forward, cringing when Marinette turned to him with her eyes wide as saucers. “I mean, it’s not done yet! I… I’m still working on it, and I know you’re still upset with me, so-!”

 

“Not… not done…?” Marinette repeated blankly, looking back down at the notebook in her hands and flipping forward until she found where the model had left off- _986.) Her hiccups sound like a baby bird peeping_ \- “There’s almost a thousand points in here. You don’t think that’s enough?”

 

“No way. Not even close.” Adrien replied, dragging a hand through his hair. “Look, Marinette. I know I’ve messed up. A lot. But I wasn’t lying when I said I want to be with you. And I don’t want you thinking that you’re second place instead of being the grand prize. I thought maybe this would be a good way to show how I saw you, and once I started, I couldn’t find a good place to stop.” Marinette’s head reeled at that. Tears started to gather in the corners of her eyes once more, these ones far different than the ones that had sent her running to the bathroom in the first place. Nonetheless, Adrien panicked at the sight of them. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you or-!” The rest of the blond’s apology was cut off by the grunt of pain that came with the small girl literally throwing herself into his chest, arms wrapping around his torso in a vice-like embrace as she buried her face in the dark cotton of his shirt.

 

She felt like an even bigger idiot now than she did before, honestly. For jumping to conclusions and not believing Adrien when he said they weren’t true. For making both him and herself miserable and hurt because she couldn’t believe that Adrien could ever honestly like a plain, simple girl like Marinette when he was surrounded by beauty and splendor the likes of which she’d never known. For making him feel like he had to prove he liked her, because she was insecure and stubborn and everything he didn’t deserve to put up with, but did anyways.

 

Because he liked her.

 

He liked her. Adrien Agreste. Chat Noir. He liked Marinette Dupain-Cheng. The truth of that was clear to her as she sobbed into Adrien’s shirt with her words- of gratitude, of apology, of love- all stuck in her throat. As clear as the words written across the first page of the notebook she still clutched in her hands.

 

_ Reasons I Like Marinette Dupain-Cheng _


	14. In Which There Is That Greatest of Gifts, Which Is Hope

Howling pandemonium envelops the room about half a second after the door clatters shut behind Marinette.

“What the flying fuck was that!” Alya shouts, turning to face Chloe, full of righteous sound and fury, a wrathful goddess of bloodthirsty, painful, and personally satisfying vengeance.  Nino rounds on Chloe on the heels of Alya’s cry, the two shouting over each other.

“That was out of line, Chloe,” Nino says, his normally good-natured smile replaced with a fiery glower, his voice carrying the undertones of a snarling wolf.  “That was so far over the fucking line that you can see _China_ from where you are right now.”

“You know she’s still worked up over the whole nearly dying thing and then you decide to pull this bullfuckery?” Alya says, continuing her rant.  “What the fuck?  I know you don’t have a single fucking shred of basic decency in you but this is low even for you!”

“Like, what the hell?” Nino says.  “What the _hell_ has she ever done to you for you to justify this?  This is _assault_ for Christssake!”

Rose edges around the argument around Chloe as it starts to devolve into a riot and shuffles worriedly down to Adrien, who stands like a statue at the front of the class, his knuckles going white as they tighten on the strap of his bag.

“Is she all right?” Rose says.  After a few seconds without a response, she taps him carefully on the shoulder.  “Is Marinette all right?” she repeats, as Adrien blinks and looks down at her.

“I,” he says, “I don’t know.”  He looks back at Chloe as she starts to shriek back at Alix. “I don’t know,” he says.  “I’ll go find out.”

“I’ll come with,” Rose says.  Adrien nods and opens the classroom door for her as behind them, Ivan restrains Mylene, then follows her out.

It isn’t hard to work out where Marinette would go.  She needs to get the honey off.  Ergo, she’s going to go someplace to wash it off.

“Lemme check,” Rose says.  She cracks open the door to the girl’s restroom, the sound of running water not quite drowning out someone’s frantic whimpering coming into the hall.  Then she opens it just wide enough for her to stick her head in and look around.  After a second she steps back into the hall and lets the door shut.

“She’s in a bad way,” Rose says.  Adrien nods, mutely.  He drops his gaze to the tips of his shoes, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“How do we help?” Rose says.  “Do we just go in and talk to her?  Talk her through it?”

Adrien shrugs.

They both turn and stare at the door.  Someone whimpers, the sound muffled by the heavy, solid wood.

“Look,” Adrien says, turning from the door with an effort of will, “you go back, try to keep everyone from murdering Chloe. “I’ll”—he gestures vaguely at the door with a hand—“stick around.  See if I can’t help her.”

“Are you sure?” Rose says.

“Yes,” Adrien says.  “She can’t stay in there forever.”

“All right,” Rose says.  She turns and shuffles back down the hall towards the classroom.

By now maybe a dozen people are lining the hall outside the classroom, peering curiously in through the glass, with stragglers wandering in at the edges of the growing crowd.  Rose pushes her way back in with the occasional “I’m sorry” and “excuse me, coming through”.

The noise slaps her in the face as she opens the door.

“—I don’t see what the problem was,” Chloe sniffs, although it’s more accurate if less charitable to call it a shriek.  “It was just some stupid prank, it isn’t my problem if she can’t handle it.”

“A prank?” Alya shouts, jabbing a finger at Chloe with such unconstrained hate that Rose is surprised that it doesn’t go clear through her skull, the desk behind her, Ivan’s leg behind that, and the wall behind him.  “A prank? You call intentionally triggering her a fucking _prank?_ ”

“Trigger this, trigger that,” Chloe says, waving a hand dismissively.  “If she’s going to be that much of a whiny little—“

“She nearly died,” Ivan rumbles with an ursine growl.  “That isn’t anything to whine about, or joke about, either.”

“My point exactly,” Chloe says, patting Ivan on the arm.  His eyes narrow, and for a second his iron grip on Mylene’s arm loosens.  “If she’s going to whine about something like that—“

“You stupid bitch, he meant that if you think that she’s whining about it then you need to get your head out of your gilded ass!”

“Excuse me?” Chloe says, rounding on Mylene. “What did you just call me, you little half-pint—“

“It’s true,” Nathaneal chimes in, his voice quavering and high-pitched, his face gone nearly as red as his hair.  He flinches back a little as Chloe turns to him in turn, her mouth open for another tirade but continues determinedly.

“What have any of us done to you, Chloe?” he says. “What did any of us ever do to you? We’ve been stuck in the same stupid classes with you for three years, and none of us did a thing to deserve this. Three years we’ve needed to put up with you mocking us and torturing us day by day and not a one of us complained and you think you’re the victim here?  None of us ever did anything to you to deserve this, none of us so much as said a word in complaint, and yet somehow we’ve offended you, somehow our very existence mocks you enough that you need to do this to us?”

He pauses, the room gone suddenly silent, his teary stare fixed on Chloe’s expression, something rigid and horrible and terrible to behold, a mask of fury and hate and unrestrained contempt in the face of his quiet reserve.

“What the hell, Chloe?” he says finally.

“Deserve?” Chloe says, her voice a rising, furious shriek. “Deserve?  I’ve had to be stuck with you plebes for all this time and you dare to talk to me about what you deserve?  What I deserve is to not be here!”

“You really don’t have the empathy of a crocodile, do you,” Juleka says.  “You really think that all of this is about you.”

“Well, it isn’t as though any of you are important enough to care about,” Chloe says.

Rose and Max edge aside as the shouting erupts again, joining Kim and Lila next to the window.  Lila idly examines a nail as she lounges in her chair.

“What,” Lila says as they settle into seats beside her. “You two aren’t going to join in the fun?”

“No,” Max says.

“No,” Rose says.

Lila snorts.  “Shouty, isn’t she?” she says.

“Who?”

“Chloe.”

“Ah.  Yeah.”

More silence around them, as the shouting rises to a fever pitch around Chloe.

“She didn’t used to be this bad,” Kim volunteers as feeble defense.

“Really,” Lila says.

“No, really, she wasn’t,” Kim says.

“Kim, she’s been the direct cause of fifty percent of the supervillains terrorizing the city, not including herself,” Max says. “You were one of them.”

“Yeah, but that’s recent,” Kim says.

“If by ‘recent’ you mean ‘since the beginning of collegé’,” Max says.  “Just over three and a half years now.”

“What, you have a crush on her or something?” Lila says.

Dead silence.  Rose fixes her gaze down at her hands.  Max and Kim look away from each other.  Chloe’s screaming hits glass-shattering pitches.

“ _Che cazzo,_ ” Lila says under her breath.  “I get that she’s pretty, but how in the world could you find that attractive?  You’d be better off kissing a viper.”

“She wasn’t that bad before,” Kim says again.

“Before what?”

“Before Adrien started coming here,” Max says. “If you could chart her behavior on a ‘Time versus Generalized Maliciousness’ graph there’d be a nice sharp downturn just about when Adrien started coming here.”

Lila’s eyes slide half-shut in idle contemplation, her lips pursing in thought.  “Hm.”

“Yeah, they used to be friends from way back,” Kim says.

“Are friends,” Rose corrects quietly.

“Sure, whatever,” Kim says.  “And she’s staked her claim on him, doesn’t like anyone else getting close.  Especially doesn’t like Marinette getting close.”

“And sweet little Mari is sweet on Adrien, too,” Lila murmurs.

“What was that?” Rose says, raising her voice to be heard over Ivan’s own, booming shout as it crowds out Chloe’s screaming.

“Nothing,” Lila says, waving a hand.  “Don’t worry about it.”

So Marinette has a crush on Adrien, Lila muses. Marinette, whom everyone adores, whom, insofar as she’d been able to ascertain, everyone wants to get together with Adrien—with the notable exception of Chloe, of course.

The shouting reaches a shrill, fever pitch as Lila opens her mouth to comment.

“That’s enough,” someone says.

Adrien doesn’t raise his voice, doesn’t bother to shout like Alix or scream like Chloe or menace like Mylene.  He simply stands there in the doorway, his gaze flat and hard as chips of emerald, holding the door open behind him, and the room quiets.

“Adrikins—“

“Stop, Chloe,” Adrien says.  “Listen, Marinette’s still pretty shaken up, I’m going to tell Mr. Damocles and walk her home.  If Mme. Bustier comes in can someone tell her where we are?  I’ll be back in a few.”

“Oh, come on,” Chloe says.

“I said that’s enough, Chloe,” Adrien says. Without a further word he turns on his heel and walks out into the hall, letting the door _boom_ shut behind him.  The heads of everyone present turn to follow him.

And apparently, Lila thinks, he’s sweet on her. Although it’d be hard to pick that out from the general background noise of his behavior.

Hm.

* * *

“Thanks for this,” Marinette says as Adrien walks a step behind her and slightly to her right.  They stop by the crosswalk, waiting for the light to change.

“It’s no problem,” Adrien says.  “I’m sorry about Chloe.”

Marinette’s brow furrows as a flashing “WALK” sign pops up and they dutifully follow their given instructions.  “What do you mean?”

“I could’ve done more,” Adrien says.  “To discourage her from, y’know.  Stuff like this.”

Marinette flinches very slightly, and Adrien winces. “Sorry,” he says again.

“Adrien,” Marinette says, “Chloe’s been on my case for years now.”

Her response draws another wince from Adrien. “Look, my point is that I can handle her,” Marinette says.  “I’ve handled her.”

“I don’t want to sound condescending, but I don’t think you had multiple easily-exploited triggers back then,” Adrien says.  “And she wasn’t as bad a few years ago.  At least with me.”

“You are probably the only person that Chloe treats like an actual human,” Marinette grumbles.  Adrien opens the bakery’s front door and holds it open for her. “Everyone else is just for her to run over or boss around.”

“It’s more complicated than that,” Adrien protests half-heartedly.

“Really?” Marinette says.  “I’d like to hear that.”

“Maybe tonight?” Adrien says, and for a moment his smile flashes through his polite, unobtrusive demeanor, all lightning and spark, all Chat.

Then it flickers and falters.  “I mean,” he adds, “if you’re okay with that.”

Marinette turns and looks at Adrien as Tom and Sabine poke their heads into the bustling bakery, staring curiously.

“Sure,” Marinette says.  “I’d like that.”

The smile lashes across his face again, there and then gone, leaving only the afterimage in its wake.  And then Adrien turns and begins to walk back towards the school, his hands in his pockets.

“Wait,” Marinette says.  Adrien stops and looks over his shoulder, quirking his head curiously to a side.

“Bring your bag,” she says.  “I’ll see what I can do with it.”

One brief explanation to her parents later and Marinette finds herself in her room.  Her nice, safe, private room.  She walks over to the window, draws the heavy curtains closed over it, then pops open her clutch and lets Tikki out.

“He likes me, Tikki,” she says, her vision going a little blurry.  “He really does, he really likes me.  Not just for the celebrity factor.  He likes _me_.”

“I told you so,” Tikki says with just a hint of smugness in their calm, level tone.

Marinette spends a few moments wiping happy tears from her eyes.  “So that was his kwami?” she asks.

“Pardon?”

“That black blur thing, saw it zip out of his bag, into his shirt,” Marinette says.  “That’s Adrien’s kwami, right?”

“Oh, you mean Plagg,” Tikki says.  “Yes, it was.”

Marinette leaves her bag by her desk and climbs up to her bed, curling up beneath the heavy warmth of her blankets.  Tikki follows and settles down onto the pillow beside Marinette’s head, glowing like a dim ember in the gloom, flashing briefly into incandescence as they pass through the shaft of afternoon sunlight coming through the skylight.

“What’s he like?” Marinette asks.

“Plagg?” Tikki says.

“Yeah.”

“They’re a lot like Adrien,” Tikki says.  “Our chosen are always a little like us, to some degree.  Some lesser, some greater, but Adrien and Plagg are sympathetic souls.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“They’re good people,” Tikki says.  “They care, instinctively, but Plagg hides it better than Adrien does, they’ve had more practice after all.  Plagg is all chaos and entropy, where I am order and harmony; all destruction where I am constructive, and there is that in Adrien too. He burns himself to light the way for others, and hides the clamor in his heart behind his smile.”

Marinette frowns slightly.  “He shouldn’t need to,” she says.

“Which is why Ladybug exists,” Tikki says. “Which is why you exist.”

“You keep calling Plagg they,” Marinette says. “Why?”

“Well,” Tikki says, “we are not what you would call human.  We are life and death, energy manifest, beings of spirit rather than flesh, immortal rather than mortal.”

“I’m sorry,” Marinette says.  “I’ve been calling you ‘she’ all this time, do you want me to stop?”

“It’s all right,” Tikki says.  “Don’t worry about—“

Before Tikki can finish their sentence someone knocks at the trapdoor.  Tikki zips into hiding as, a second later, Sabine opens the door and pops her head inside.

“Mari?” Sabine says.  “So dark in here, why didn’t you turn the lights on, Mari dear?”

“Mama?” Marinette says, popping her head out over the edge of her bed.

“Your father and I are going to go talk to Mr. Damocles after school today,” Sabine says.  “Chloe is going altogether too far now.  Where’s your bag?”

“Next to my desk, Mama,” Marinette says.  “And please don’t, it’s not going to do anything—“

“The girl is deliberately trying to traumatize you,” Sabine says.  “Even if that’s not against some law it’s at the very least wrong, and we’re going to do what we can to put a stop to it.”

The stout woman plants her feet, hands on hips, and shoots her daughter a direct look.  “Your father and I will talk to Mr. Damocles about this,” she repeats.

“Yes, Mama.”

“Right.  Now, I’m going to go clean out your bag.”

Sabine kneels, picks up the bag—Marinette tries not to retch as the movement wafts a hint of the horribly sickly-sweet smell up towards her—and starts down the stairs.

“Oh, Mama?”  Marinette says, just before Sabine closes the trapdoor behind her.

“Yes, dear?”

“Can I use the bakery again tonight?”

Sabine turns a questioning look on her, then shrugs.

“Of course, dear.  Just be sure to clean up after yourself.”

“Thank you, Mama.”

* * *

Alya and Nino—no Adrien, but he’ll be by later tonight anyways—pay her a visit, entering just as Tom and Sabine shoo out the last of their customers and are about to lock up.

“Mari,” Alya says, looking around the living room. “Marinette?”

“Hang on,” Marinette says, her voice muffled by the intervening floor.  After some quiet cursing and a succession of thumping footfalls, the trapdoor creaks open and Marinette hurries down.

“Hey, Marinette,” Alya says, giving her a quick hug. “You feeling better?”

Marinette snorts quietly and pulls away.  “I’ve been feeling better, but Adrien insisted.”

“Someone seriously needs to get that bitch in line,” Alya says.

“Who?” Nino asks.  “Her dad won’t, Adrien can’t, if freaking Ladybug swooped down out of the sky and asked Chloe, ‘could you please cut that shit out’ she wouldn’t.”

“Adrien seemed to think that he could,” Marinette says.

Alya and Nino snort simultaneously.  “Adrien is a great guy,” Alya says, “but he is as naïve as a concussed puppy sometimes.  When has Chloe ever listened to him?”

“Hey, maybe he’s serious this time,” Nino says in feeble defense.

"Babe, I like him as much as you do, but you know he isn’t one for confrontation,” Alya says.

At least, when he’s not wearing a magical leather catsuit, and when the confrontation involves people rather than supervillains and talking instead of, say, punching, kicking, biting, and being flailed around by me, Marinette thinks.

Out loud she says, “Chloe does what Chloe wants, guys.  If Adrien actually can get through to her, it’ll be a nice bonus.”

“Seconded,” Nino says.

“Look, I don’t want to talk about _her_ ,” Marinette says.  “What’d I miss in class?”

“Not much,” Alya says.  “Got some more history reading on the Romans to do, and there’s a quiz on Friday on the Republic.  Nino has the notes from math.”

“You guys are life-savers,” Marinette says, “thank you.”

“No prob,” Nino says.  He pauses, glancing at Alya.  Alya glances back.

“Out with it,” Marinette says.

“You’re sure that you’re all right,” Alya says hesitantly.  “I mean you nearly _died,_ Mari, that’s not something that you just get over in the span of a week, and Chloe triggered you pretty badly today—“

_—the red-pulsing darkness creeping in at the corners of her vision—_

“—I mean, you know that if you need to talk about it you can, right?  Nino and Adrien and I aren’t going to judge you or anything about it—“

— _the syllables of her name ragged and saw-edged—_

“I’m fine,” Marinette says, with a little more force than she’d intended.  Alya and Nino lean backwards from her.

“I’m fine,” she repeats.  “I don’t want to talk about it.  Let’s go play some Mecha Strike.  I need to kick someone’s ass.”

Tom and Sabine come back about an hour after that, Sabine’s face flushed and red, Tom’s set in a rigid, granite-hard mask. They greet Alya and Nino politely enough, issue a warning to Marinette to “make sure your homework gets done, Mari,” and head down to their room.  Alya and Nino bid their goodbyes soon after that.

And then, after a brief and quietly tense dinner, Marinette heads down to the bakery.

She goes about starting the oven and collecting the flour and salt and sugar and eggs, forgetting the butter and going back to their industrial-sized refrigerator for a lump smaller than her head.

Cream the sugar and butter in the mixing bowl together, bring it down to the lowest setting to incorporate the eggs.  Does she need to separate the yolks?  Dunno.  Whole eggs then.  Vanilla, salt, flour, mix as little as possible once the flour’s in.  Does she want strawberries?  Eh, later.

She loses herself in the gentle rhythms of movement, the familiar patterns of weighing and mixing and scraping and pouring. She goes to fill the springform pan—shoot, she’d forgotten to line it, where was the parchment paper—and sticks the filled pan into the oven.  She licks the spatula clean and dumps the mixing bowl in the sink, leaving the faucet on over it, and digs around in the fridge again for the industrial-sized carton of strawberries.  She sets the strawberries on the table and is just starting to scrub out the mixing bowl with a sudden light knocking at the bakery’s front door makes her jump, spilling suds and hot water over the front of her shirt.

Her white shirt.

“Well, at least it didn’t hit me in the boob,” she mutters to herself.

She shuts off the faucet with an elbow, wrings out her shirt, dries off her hands, and goes to let Chat Noir in.

Her heart goes wobbly as she sees his nervous smile.  How could she have ever missed that her adorable, dorky, lovable, goofy, flirty, loyal, wonderful, gorgeously wonderful kitty was anyone but Adrien Agreste?

“May I come in?” he asks.

“Mm, I don’t know,” she says.  “I’m a taken woman now, might be untoward to let another man into my home this late at night.  People might talk.”

Nervousness segues into actual worry for a second before he catches on and adopts his most pathetic expression.

“Princess,” Chat whines.

“I have my reputation to protect.” Marinette gives a little shrug. “I’m sorry, kitty.”

He pouts, his eyes going wide and watery.

“Oh no,” Marinette says.  “You aren’t convincing me with that, Chat.”

The pout increases fractionally.

“Oh, fine,” Marinette says.  “Get in before anyone sees.”

The pout is replaced by a wide, toothy grin as Chat steps inside.  Marinette shuts and locks the door behind him.

“You bring your bag?” Marinette says.

“Oh, shoot,” Chat says as he steps past her.

“It’s all right,” Marinette says.  She pulls the metal security shutter across the door and locks that as well.  “Just give it to me at school.”

She half expects him to be waiting behind her as she turns, ready to embrace her.  Heck, she’s a little shocked that he hadn’t gone for the move while her back was still turned.

Instead, she turns to see him continuing his pad-footed stalk past into the back of the bakery, towards the kitchens.

Her heart clenches in her chest as she pockets the keys and follows him back.  Had he changed his mind—no, no one wrote down near a thousand reasons that they liked someone and then changed their mind over the course of a day.  Had she done something wrong, then, trodden on some metaphorical toe by accident?  No, forget that, he’d tell her, surely—wait a minute.  What if the overprotective dork was going to pull one of those “it isn’t you it’s me and my enemies” things, ooo, if he did she was going to take him to pieces, she could damn well handle herself even without Tikki’s help.

“What are you making?” Chat asks as she comes into the kitchen.  He sniffs the air twice, then turns to the oven and kneels, peering into its interior, his tail twitching curiously.

“Pound cake,” Marinette says.

“And the strawberries?” Chat says.

“Oh, right, thanks for reminding me,” Marinette says.  She stops by the fridge and, after a second’s rummage, digs out a bottle of milk.  She sets it on the table and goes to the sink, rinsing the suds out of the mixing bowl and drying it with a dish towel.

She considers the bottle of milk for a minute, then eyes the container of sugar, then the sizable lump of butter that hadn’t made it into the cake.

Eh.  She can eyeball it.

The milk, butter, sugar, and vanilla are in the mixing bowl, the whisk attachment whirring away, before Chat speaks.

“Marinette?” Chat says.

“Hm?”  Her attention focuses more sharply on the mix.

“What,” he says, then stops.  Marinette scrapes down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, then, after another minute, shuts off the mixer and brings the bowl to the table. She grabs a knife from a knife strip behind her, hones it briefly on an iron with a succession of menacing _shk-shk-shk_ noises, and sets to dicing a double handful of strawberries.  Chat watches her, his eyes tracking her hands as they move, quick and sure and precise.

“What are we?” Chat says, as she finishes dicing the last of the strawberries and dumps the entire load into the mixing bowl, turning the mix over a few times with the spatula.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean—look, can you please stop for a moment?”

Marinette puts the bowl down on the table.  The steel rings against the marble with a muted _clunk_.

Chat sighs and runs a hand through his goldenrod mop.  “Look, I assume that we made up.  Or that we’re at least in a better place than we were.”

“Yes,” Marinette says, “we are.  And we did make up.”

“Okay,” Chat says.  “Good to know that we’ve got that laid down.”

He meets her eyes for a moment.

“But what are we, exactly,” he says. “Friends?  Testing the waters?  I just don’t know, Marinette.”

“Well,” Marinette says.  “Um.  What do you want us to be?”

“I want to be your boyfriend,” Chat says.

Aaaaaaand _clench_.  Marinette feels suddenly lightheaded, her face steadily warming towards fever-hot. Her pulse roars in her ears, so loudly that she almost misses his hastily tacked-on addition of “shoot, I’m sorry, was that too forward?  That was too forward, wasn’t it, I should’ve at least asked you first or something, I am so sorry—“

“Adrien,” she says.  “Chat, stop.”

His jaw snaps shut with an audible _clack_ and he shrinks a little.

“I would,” she says, fighting to keep the “holy shit you’re not fucking with me are you you dorky silly cat I’d love to be your girlfriend and you’re seriously asking me this sign me the fuck up where’s the marriage contract someone call a priest” from spewing out alongside, “like that. For you to be my boyfriend.  I’d like that very much.”

“You, uh,” he says.  “You would?”

Clamp down on the “of course I fucking would I told you that I loved you for pete’s sake, you might’ve made a few major mistakes before we got here but that hasn’t changed out I feel about you all that much”, Dupain-Cheng, don’t say it, be dignified, one of you needs to be right now.

“Yes,” she says—all right, squeaks—feeling her blush tick up a few notches on the thermometer.

They stand there, the table and the bowl of frosting between them.

Chat swallows.

“Uh,” he says.  “Do you want to.  Make it official?”

It takes her a second to put two and two together.

Wow.  She’d thought her blush had been heated before.  Apparently, it’d been little more than a candle compared to the supernova the blossoms in her face and neck and ears now.

She nods, not trusting her tongue to say something stupid.

They move at the same time, each taking a step to the side.  After a second’s hesitation they take another step, again in tandem, then another, maintaining the slow, even pace until the table is no longer between them.  Marinette can see his pupils dilate, his breathing quicken, his Adam’s apple bob as they close, the heat of their bodies between them.

“So,” he says.  “How do you want to do this?”

“I mean,” he adds hastily, “like, I lean down, you lean up?  I guess? Or do we just, uh—“

“Let’s just wing it, Marinette says.  She reaches up and twines her arms around his neck, noting the sudden break in his breathing as she does—smooth, Marinette, that’s good—and tugs gently until Chat leans down to meet her.  His breath puffs lightly across her lips, minty fresh. Even after all of their recent revelations, it was somehow incredibly comforting to know that he was just as nervous and excited and nervously excited about this as she was.

And better prepared.  She was sure that her breath still stinks of dinner—all right, shut up, Marinette, just kiss him.

His brows and nose wrinkle as he sniffs, straightening slightly.

“What’s burning?” he says.

“Shit,” Marinette curses as she darts to the oven and wrenches it open, plucking the cake-filled pan— _shit shit shit ow hot shit ow—_ from the oven.  She tosses it onto the table, where it clatters and spins and nearly falls off before Chat fields it.  She slaps on the cold water in the nearest sink and sticks her hand underneath the icy stream.

“How’s it look?” she says.  “ _Ow._ ”

“Fine,” Chat says.  “A little charred on top but that’s it, are you all—“

“Great,” Marinette says.  “Can you go grab the electric knife?  It’s in the drawer below the knife strip.”

“Sure,” Chat says.  She hears him rattling around as she shuts off the water and dries her hands. “Don’t you need one of those cake thingies, those cardboard flat things you put beneath a cake to keep it from getting dirty?”

“What?” Marinette says.  “Oh, cake board.  I’ll get it.”

She fumbles a circle of cardboard from a cabinet with a hand and frisbees it towards Chat.  It bounces off of his chest and clatters to the table.

“Can you set it up?” Marinette says, examining the tender spots of red forming on the fingers of her left hand.  “Shoot, you might need to do the decorating. Should’ve grabbed it by the paper.”

Chat instead comes to her side and gently takes her hand in both of his own, turning it this way and that in the light.  “You think it’ll blister?” he says.

“Probably,” Marinette says, pulling lightly away from him. “That was stupid of me.”

“Don’t say that,” Chat says.

“Well, it was,” Marinette says.  “And don’t, some things just are.  Shoo, go and prep the cake.”

Chat heaves out a sigh, but turns and walks to the table without protest.  He opens up the springform pan after a second’s examination, the suit’s magic letting him handle the hot metal without fear.  With deft motions he places the board beneath the cake and tugs the parchment paper free, crumpling it into a ball and placing it to the side.

“Cut it in half, no, wait, uh, cut halfway between the top and the bottom?” Chat asks, plugging in the electric knife.  It whirrs a few times as he tests it.

“Yeah,” Marinette says.  She rummages in another drawer and plucks out a frosting spatula, turning to the counter just as Chat finishes and lays the knife aside. “Right, I don’t have enough hands for this, can you nudge the frosting over here and just put the top of that somewhere clean, just grab a plate or something.  Gently—“

“I know, Princess,” Chat says, with a lightly amused, lilting tone.  “I’m not wholly incompetent here.”

“Sorry,” Marinette says.

She accepts the bottom cake half from Chat and places it clumsily on the turntable, bracing the cake board against the back of her left thumb.  Chat watches as she fumbles with the bowl of frosting before he takes it from her.

“I hold, you scoop?” he suggests.

“That works,” Marinette says, a little grumpily. She scoops a generous dollop of chunky strawberry frosting and plops it on the cake, spreading it out with movements that would’ve been smooth and swift had she been able to use her other hand.

“Princess,” Chat says after a minute.  “I’ll handle this, go take care of your hand.”

“I’ve taken care of my hand,” Marinette says, “as much as it can be for now, anyways.”

“Then you can just point out when I mess up?”

Marinette watches as Chat finishes spreading out her dollop and then scrapes out the rest of the mixing bowl over the cake and spreads that into a smooth layer.  She takes the empty mixing bowl to the sink and rinses it out as he reassembles the cake.

“Are you going to frost the outside?” Chat asks.

“I’d need to soften another chunk of butter,” Marinette says.  “Too much trouble.  I’m not going for pretty here.”

“It looks nice enough anyways,” Chat says. “Well, aside from the burnt bit on top.”

They stare at the cake.  Neither speaks.

Finally, Marinette decides to bite the bullet.

“I think we need to talk,” Marinette says.

“About what?”

“Us.”

Chat turns to her, frowning a little.  “I thought we’d settled that.”

“Yes, you’re my boyfriend,” Marinette says, suppressing the delighted shiver that tingles down her spine at the word.  “But is Adrien my boyfriend, or is Chat?”

“I don’t follow,” Chat says.

“I mean that I want to come clean about us to my parents.”

She can hear the stunned, ringing silence that follows, and odd void of sound probably caused by the way in which Chat’s jaw drops wide open.  She does her best to fill the silence before her nerve fails.

“I mean, I don’t want to tell them that you superhero on the side,” she says.  “Or your secret identity.  Or that you, uh, have a secret identity.  At all. But I want to tell them that we’re. You know.”

“Mind if I ask why?” Chat says weakly.

“This isn’t just us hanging out in the bakery together anymore ,” Marinette says.  “This is, well.  Us. Doing other things. Presumably.  Hopefully.”

“Like what?”

“Kissing?”  Her voice goes a little squeaky towards the end.

Chat snorts.  “If another distraction doesn’t get in the way.”

“Right.”

“But that still doesn’t explain why you want me to get torn to pieces by your mother.”

“I’m sorry, what?  That makes no sense.”

Chat starts to count on his fingers.  “Well, first, your father might be big but your mother is _scary_.  Second, I’m certain that both of them have watched enough television to be aware of exactly what happens to the superhero’s girlfriend— _I’m not saying what I think I’m just saying what they’ll probably think please put the spatula down_.”

Chat unflinches and continues his count. “Thank you.  Third, if we tell your parents that you’re dating Adrien, then at some point word is going to get back to Father.”

“Why would that be an issue?”

“Uh.”  Chat lowers his hands and starts to fidget.  “Well, it isn’t that he doesn’t like you.  I think that he’s got a lot of respect for you on a professional level, Nathalie said that all he talked about for a week was your hat design that one time. It’s just that he, well.”

Marinette’s heart sinks precipitously.

“Oh,” she breathes.  She’s not going to cry, she’s not going to break down crying; collapsing into a sobbing _Romeo and Juliet_ wreck is not the correct response here, sheer bloody-minded fury is.  Shock into righteous fury, thaaat’s the ticket.

“Oh,” she mutters bitterly.  “So I’m good enough for him to take my designs, but not good enough to date his son, is that how it is?”

Chat blinks.  “Wait, what?”

“You just said—“

“Oh no,” Chat says.  “I didn’t mean that, sorry.  I mean that he doesn’t want me dating anyone.  At all.  It’s not you he objects to, it’s the uh, whole idea.  As it were.”

“What?”

“It was one of the conditions for going to school,” Adrien says.  “He doesn’t want girls distracting from my studies or something like that.”

“Your dad seems to like Chloe well enough,” Marinette says.  “Don’t see you being dragged out of school for being close to Chloe.”

Chat snorts.  “Because he knows very well that Chloe and I aren’t ever going to be like that. I like Nino and Alya well enough but I’m not planning on dating either of them.”  He gives a little shrug at Marinette’s look.  “We’re friends.  That’s it.”

“Tell that to her,” Marinette says.

“She’ll get it eventually,” Chat says.

“Right.”

The two of them lapse into silence.

“Well,” Chat says after a minute or two, “let’s make a start on the cake before it gets cold, shall we?”

“No.”

Chat makes a confused noise as whatever he had planned on saying next is stopped prematurely.

“Look, I’m nervous enough about this whole business,” Marinette says.  “Let’s just go upstairs and get it over with, Mama and Papa shouldn’t be asleep yet.”

Chat looks as though he wants to protest for a moment before he sighs.  “You’re sure?”

“Yeah,” Marinette says.  “I’m too nervy right now to eat, anyways.”

“What are we planning on telling them?” Chat asks as they traipse towards the back staircase.

“The truth,” Marinette says.

* * *

“So,” Sabine says after maybe an hour of stuttering stop-and-start exposition punctuated by moments of silent terror, “you mean to tell me that you’ve been lying to us and that you’ve been secretly seeing this boy for several weeks now.  In our bakery.”

Her icy stare remains fixed on the steadily wilting Marinette, Chat by her side, her hand clasped in his.

“What do you have to say for yourself?” Tom rumbles. He glances sternly at Chat before folding his massive arms over his chest.

“I’m sorry for not being honest,” Marinette says.

“Right,” Sabine says.  “You’re grounded for a month and I’m taking your sewing machine for two weeks.”

“Yes, Mama.”

“Right.”  Sabine’s expression softens.  “Don’t do that again, Marinette.”

“Yes, Mama.”

Tom and Sabine both turn their attention to Chat, who has to fight not to dive out the nearest window.

“We’ve never gotten a chance to thank you properly,” Tom says.  “For everything that you’ve done for our daughter.  Thank you.”

“That being said, we can’t accept this,” Sabine says.

“Why not?” Marinette says.

“As public a figure as he is,” Tom says, “he’s still a stranger.  We don’t know who he is, we don’t know what kind of life he leads when he’s not saving Paris—“

“And me,” Marinette protests, “multiple times.”

“He saves a lot of people,” Sabine says.  “That’s no argument, Mari.”

“Is your only objection the secret identity thing?” Chat says.

Marinette eyes widen.  “Chat, no—“

“You’re more important than this,” Chat says.  “And I’m sure they can keep a secret.”

“That’s not the point,” she says.  “Anyone knowing is a liability, Chat.”

“You were fine with it when you found out,” Chat says.

“That was an accident,” Marinette says.  “Chat, think this through, it’s not worth putting yourself in danger.”

“I’ll be fine,” Chat says.  He gives her hand a reassuring squeeze and stands.

“Mr. Dupain, Mrs. Cheng,” Chat says.  “Claws in.”


	15. In Which the Heart Wants What it Wants

Knowing that Adrien was Chat Noir did nothing to dampen the wonder she felt at seeing the transformation come undone right in front of her eyes for the very first time. Watching for herself as green lightning bolts of magical energy danced from steel-tipped boots all the way up to the cat ears atop his head made the breath catch in Marinette’s throat. And then the light faded and the infamous superhero Chat Noir was revealed to be supermodel Adrien Agreste, looking to her parents with shy, hopeful eyes as the little black cat Kwami she’d barely glimpsed earlier settled nonchalantly on his shoulder. Pure affection swelled in Marinette at the sight, prompting her to step forward and lace her fingers through Adrien’s in a show of solidarity.

 

“I know this probably comes as a shock.” Adrien told her parents with a small, respectful smile. “And I’m sorry I didn’t come forward sooner about the fact that I’ve been coming into your home without your permission. It was wrong of me to use my superhero identity to deceive people, and to make Marinette feel like she had to lie to you two. I know that now, and I’m really sorry.”

 

For a moment, the couple only stared, utterly stunned by the strange turn. Then a slow, small chuckle began to sound from Tom, snowballing quickly into outright guffaws that had the baker doubled over and clutching his stomach.

 

“D-Dad?” Marinette questioned, a little baffled at the reaction. She shared puzzled looks with Adrien as her father leaned over to her poker-faced mother, grinning at the small Asian woman with unbridled glee.

 

“Looks like you won our wager, my Mooncake.” Tom informed his wife affectionately.

 

“DAD!” Marinette half screamed, mortified. Oh, God, not the pet names! Not in front of Adrien! She’d take any punishment they saw fit to give her! Relinquish her phone, stay locked in her room, spend the rest of her life in indentured servitude to the bakery, anything except-!

 

“We can talk about that later, my Croquembouche.” Sabine responded. Marinette gave a low, pained whimper as Adrien’s eyes went wide and pink began to dust his cheeks.

 

Kill her now. Please.

 

“First, I want to know whose brilliant idea it was to foist the responsibility of saving a city from monsters on a fifteen-year-old boy.” Sabine continued, her tone almost conversational save for the deadly threat dripping from every word. An idea seemed to strike the woman and she frowned at Adrien sharply. “Does this mean that Ladybug is just a child as well?” Adrien’s blush darkened at the question as Marinette did her best not to break into a cold sweat.

 

“I don’t know.” He admitted. “I just found my miraculous waiting for me in my room when Stoneheart was rampaging through Paris. I have no idea who put it there.” Marinette cringed at that as she thought of the mysterious, wise old healer who had given her Tikki in a similar manner. She’d never told Chat about that meeting, at the request of the man himself. While she was sure that Fu had reasons for desiring anonymity, a sudden heavy sense of guilt began churning in her stomach at the reminder that she still hadn’t shared a lot of important secrets with Chat. “As for Ladybug… She’s very strict about us keeping our identities a secret. She doesn’t want people in unnecessary danger if they knew who we were. I mean, she told me once that she’s over 5000, but I’m pretty sure she was just kidding. Well, maybe.”

 

“I certainly hope it’s true.” Sabine said, frowning darkly. “I’d hate to think that some poor girl the same age as you and Marinette is running around Paris and throwing herself in danger. How on earth do you even hide something like this from your parents?”

 

"It's just me and my dad, Ma’am. And his assistant and my bodyguard. My house is so big and everyone’s so busy that they usually don’t even realize that I’m gone.” Adrien answered matter-of-factly. Tom and Sabine shared stricken looks at that, most likely at the realization of just how lonely Adrien’s life was. Seeing an opening, Marinette immediately jumped for a kill.

 

“Adrien’s dad is very protective. I know it’s probably because he cares about him, but it’s too extreme. Mama, remember when you told me that sometimes love means being strong enough to let someone stand on their own and find their way, with or without you?”

 

“Yes, but that was in regards to an injured pigeon you nursed back to health, sweetie. Not a teenaged superhero.” Sabine pointed out dryly.

 

“Does it make it any less true?” Marinette asked stubbornly, staring down her mother’s disapproving glower.

 

“Something tells me Jacques isn’t going to be the only boy fluttering around our bakery anymore.” Tom chuckled, grunting when Sabine elbowed him in the side before she released a loud, long sigh and studied Adrien closely.

 

“Alright.” She conceded. “I don’t like it, but… I understand that this is important to both of you.” Marinette brightened at the approval until her mother gave both of them a stern frown. “But as a mother, making sure you’re both safe is my main priority. So I want you two to promise me not to take things too far before I feel a little more certain that it won’t put either of you at risk. Adrien, you can come around and visit Marinette as a friend, but I want both of you to promise me that you’ll wait to start dating until we know it’s okay.

 

“That’s fair.” Tom agreed, nodding before giving Adrien a kind smile. “We trust you, Adrien, and we know you’re a good boy. Under normal circumstances, you’d have our full approval, but…”

 

“But these aren’t normal circumstances.” Adrien acknowledged with a wry smile. “Don’t worry sir, I understand completely and I don’t take offence. I actually struggled with the same worries when I started considering asking your daughter to accept me.”

 

“It’s nice to know you take this seriously, then.” Sabine said, giving the blond an approving look.

 

“Of course Ma’am. I’d never want to hurt Marinette.”

 

“I am pretty capable on my own, you know.” Marinette huffed, a little put out at being talked about as though she wasn’t standing right there in the room.

 

“Oh, I think we know that all too well now, young lady.” Sabine said, trying to be stern but not quite able to wipe the smile off of her face as Marinette shrunk back sheepishly. “After all, you did manage to sneak a boy into the house without our knowledge, to say nothing of the other activities I’m sure you’ve been up to that we’ll need to address once Adrien goes home. I think maybe your father and I should restrict your video games for a week, and you’re to help clean the ovens every night for a month. And Adrien, you’re not allowed to come around until Marinette has finished all her schoolwork! Your grades have slipped enough as it is, you don’t need to be distracted with flirting on top of whatever else has captured your attention lately.”

 

“I can help with the studying!” Adrien volunteered. “I’m good at that, since it’s pretty much all I’ve ever been allowed to do other than modelling or my video games.”

 

“That’s sweet of you, dear, but I think we’ll let Marinette go it alone for now, until we Tom and I have had time to get more comfortable with all of this.” Sabine said in dry amusement. “You’ll both still see each other at school, and I don’t mind you talking over the phones but lets give it about a week or so for everything to settle. After that, we’ll consider letting you two study here together, as long as it’s in the living room and not Marinette’s bedroom.”

 

“Of course, Ma’am!” Adrien agreed quickly, his cheeks reddening slightly as Marinette considered throwing herself out the second story window.

 

“Good. It’s nice to have a few ground rules.” Tom beamed, setting a hand on Sabine’s shoulder and giving an affectionate squeeze. “Marinette, your punishment will officially begin tomorrow morning. We’ll give you a grace period for tonight since today was rather… stressful, to say the least. Now let’s say we try some of that cake you baked earlier before it gets too late and Adrien has to go home.”

 

“Really?” Adrien said, face lighting up with glee at the idea of getting to spend time with Marinette and her parents over sweets. Marinette smiled, warmed by the fact that things were finally taking a turn for the better. The last few weeks had been the worst kind of emotional roller coaster, but it was all behind her now and the future was bright.

 

She doubted that anything could spoil this for her now.

 

\---

 

While growing up, Marinette had never understood the stereotypes TV and movies had about teenaged girls in love. The idea that suddenly there was a boy, and nothing and no one else mattered. Parents were lied to, friends abandoned, and morals compromised because a girl was so desperate to keep a boy that she’d do anything and everything for him.

 

It wasn’t until she met Adrien and found herself swept away in a tidal was of hormones and emotions that she could start seeing things a little differently, but even then there were some issues where she would always and forever refuse to budge. Her parent’s trust, for example, was sacred, and she’d never do anything to lose that if she could help it. Alya was her hero as much as Ladybug was the bloggers, and her friendship would always be one of the most important bonds Marinette had ever been given.

 

(The morals one… well, that was a little more of a gray area, honestly.)

 

But as many things as TV and movies got wrong about how a girl in love ought to act, there were also a few areas they got satisfyingly right, and the late night calls in bed just to hear your boyfriend (Well, maybe they were dating yet, but soon! Her parents were open to the idea after a trial period!) was definitely one of them.

 

Laying back on her pillow and smiling up lazily at the ceiling as Adrien’s voice drifted soft and low through her phone to her ear, Marinette wondered if life could get any better than this.

 

"You were amazing today." She told him, because she hadn’t been able to say it in front of her parents and it desperately needed to be said. “I still can’t believe you revealed yourself to my parents so they’d accept us. You didn’t have to do that, you know.”

 

 _“Yes I did.”_ Adrien responded with utmost confidence. _“You and your parents… You guys aren’t like me and my dad. I’m not going to make you lie or sneak around because I’m too selfish to accept that they deserve to know who their daughter’s with. And you shouldn’t have to feel like you need to hide things from your parents because of me. You should be able to tell your parents everything, Marinette.”_

 

“I’m just glad they took it so well.” Marinette confessed, giving a little smile.

 

 _“It’s amazing how accepting they are. You’re really lucky.”_ Adrien said, his voice taking on a more wistful tone that made Marinette’s heart ache. Biting her lip uncertainly Marinette spoke up, hesitantly and slowly, afraid she might be overstepping but feeling as though this was something that couldn’t be ignored.

 

"Maybe... Maybe you can talk to your dad? See if you can get him to warm up to the idea of you dating?”

 

 _“Even if I could find a way to squeeze myself into his schedule, I doubt he’d actually listen to anything I have to say.”_ Adrien responded flatly. _“My father is a control freak. I can only go places he allows me to go to, talk to people he approves of, wear what he chooses… I can’t even eat without him approving of specialized a meal schedule for me every week.”_

 

“A **_meal schedule_**?” Marinette repeated, stunned and horrified at the implications of such a thing.

 

 _"It's not as bad as it probably sounds,”_ came Adrien’s sheepish reply. He probably hadn’t meant to let that one slip, but got carried away with his frustration. Marinette’s heart clenched, both at his predicament and the way he tried so hard to act like it wasn’t a big deal. _“It’s not like he’s starving me or anything. I just… My intakes of things like sugar, fats and caffeine are all very carefully controlled.”_

 

“Well then.” Marinette hummed. “Guess it’s a good thing you know someone who has connections and can smuggle you sweets any time you want them.”

 

 _“Don’t make promises you’ll regret, Princess.”_ Adrien warned her only half-jokingly. _“I’ll be a balloon in a month if you try and satisfy my sweet tooth. Do you really want me putting on all that weight?”_

 

"It doesn't matter, as long as you’re happy.” Marinette replied automatically. “You’ll still be perfect either way.” A long lapse of silence followed that frank statement, and Marinette felt her face start to redden as it dragged on to an uncomfortable amount. “Sorry. Was that weird, or…?”

 

 _“No!”_ Adrien responded quickly, sounding a little flustered. _“No, It’s just that no one’s ever said anything like that to me before.”_ He was so happily stunned by Marinette’s offhand remark that the girl flushed even harder, suddenly feeling shy all over again. _“Thank you, Marinette.”_

 

Marinette smiled at that, burying her face in her pillow as happy butterflies danced in her stomach.

 

_“As far as my dad goes though, let’s worry about him later. I have other things I want to think about right now. Like where we’ll be having our first date after we get the thumbs up from your parents.”_

 

“I… thought that we were just having it here? At my house?” Marinette’s eyebrows furrowed together in confusion as to why that would even be a matter of consideration. “I mean, you and I can’t exactly date as Marinette and Adrien, and me going around with Chat Noir in public is bound to get people’s attention…”

 

 _“Because Chat Noir is so devilishly handsome and amazingly cool?”_ Adrien said in delight.

 

“I guess so, if furries are your thing.” Marinette teased before she could catch herself, finding it all too easy to fall into the familiar playful banter that Ladybug had with her partner when she just had Adrien’s voice to go on instead of looking him in the face.

 

 _“Does that mean furries are your thing then?”_ Adrien teased right back.

 

“No, but apparently dorky blonds who are too nice for their own good are.” Marinette said thoughtfully. “Which does explain why Link was my first love as a child.”

 

 _“Nice to know you have a type.”_ Adrien chuckled. _“I was always more into Sango from Inuyasha myself. Beautiful, smart and capable girl who put family first and never took crap from anybody? That’s my fantasy woman right there.”_

 

“Oh now that’s not fair!” Marinette said with a dramatic pout. “She’s a demon slayer! How am I supposed to compete with THAT?”

 

 _“I’ve seen you handle Chloe, Marinette. Something tells me that a demon would be a walk in the park for you.”_ Adrien replied. _“Besides, I’m up against a guy who’s saved the world, like a dozen times. You don’t think that’s hard to measure up to?”_

 

“Yeah, it’s not like you make a habit out of running around in magical spandex fighting evil butterflies or anything, right?”

 

 _"With help. Lots of help. From a girl who could kick my ass without breaking a sweat.”_ Adrien reminded her before giving a long, fearful groan. _“Oh, no…”_

 

“What is it? Is something wrong?” Marinette asked worriedly.

 

 _“Ladybug.”_ Adrien moaned. _“I have to tell Ladybug that three people know my secret identity now. She’s gonna use me for target practice when she finds out.”_

 

“I’m sure she won’t be that upset with you.” Marinette said, the irony of the situation not escaping her in the least.

 

_“No, you don’t understand, Marinette. You don’t know her like I do. She’s gonna kill me.”_

 

“Don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic?”

 

_“I once saw her just look at a reporter who was following us to find out who we really are, and he immediately smashed his own camera rather than risk getting on her bad side. She takes our secret identities really seriously. And she’s hands down the most stubborn and combative person I know.”_

 

“Is that so?” Marinette asked, steel edging into her tone. “Sounds like she’s pretty hard to work with, if you ask me.”

 

 _"No! Not at all! I mean, don't get me wrong, she's really brilliant and a great friend. She just gets a little tunnel-visioned sometimes.”_ Marinette relaxed a little at that, contemplating for a moment before deciding to let the slights slide. It wasn’t like she had never voiced complaints about Chat Noir and his flippant flirting and cocky, devil-may-care attitude after all. And yet she wouldn’t replace him for all the art in the Louvre.

 

Her dorky, dramatic kitty cat.

 

“Just talk to her. I bet it’ll go a lot better than you expect,” she advised him with a knowing little smile.

 

_“I hope you’re right. Last thing I want is for her to be disappointed in me.”_

 

“She could never be disappointed in you!” Marinette insisted, frowning a little. Just what kind of impression did Adrien have of her to think such a thing?

 

 _“I guess I am pretty pawesome, aren’t I?”_ Adrien joked. Marinette’s eye twitched slightly, as she reconsidered her last statement. _“Don’t worry, Marinette. Whatever happens, you got this cat in the bag.”_

 

 

“I certainly hope not. That sounds rather cruel.” Marinette sassed, reluctantly letting the matter go.

 

Clearly, this was something that needed to be discussed as Ladybug rather than Marinette.

 

 _"I better turn in before I get your parents mad for keeping you up all hours of the night and ban me from ever seeing you again.”_ Adrien said warmly.

 

“They’d never do that. They love you.” Marinette informed him. “Mom wanted to know what you’d like her to pack you for a snack tomorrow before school starts, and Dad wants your handle for DCU Online. I still can’t believe you play that by the way. Don’t you get enough of being a superhero in real life?” Marinette certainly did.

 

She couldn’t play certain RPGs anymore without wondering what she’d do if she found herself in a hostage situation for real, or what she would do if she had to choose between letting one person die to save others. Now that that was her reality rather than just a fictional story playing out for her own entertainment and excitement, it left a rather bitter taste in her mouth and left her anxious and sleepless at night.

 

Hence the reason she mostly stuck with the straightforward fighting games, racing games, or lighter, sillier adventure stories rather than the ones that were more emotionally intense.

 

 _“Never.”_ Adrien laughed. _“I finally feel like I’m doing something useful with myself. It’s frustrating to spend your whole life staring out a window, watching other people live as you are kept safe and sound under lock and key. I love being a superhero, and wouldn’t give it up for anything.”_

 

“Well then, Ladybug’s lucky to have a partner who’s as devoted and good at their job as you are.” Marinette told him with utmost confidence. “I’m more sure than ever now she won’t get mad at you when you talk to her.”

 

 _“Let’s hope you’re right.”_ Adrien said, clearly touched by Marinette’s words. _“Better let you turn in now. See you tomorrow at school?”_

 

"If I don’t oversleep again.” Marinette joked, grinning when Adrien laughed.

 

 _“Good night, Princess.”_ Adrien bid.

 

“Nighty-night, Kitty.” Marinette returned, smiling into her pillow as she waited for the familiar click of a call being ended.

 

After about twenty seconds, it became clear that the call wasn’t ending any time soon.

 

“Aren’t you going to hang up?” Marinette asked, grinning despite herself.

 

 _“Aren’t you?”_ Adrien countered.

 

“Adrien!” Marinette giggled. “You said good night first, so you should hang up first!”

 

 _“Says who?”_ Adrien demanded, clearly laughing himself.

 

“Okay, so how about we count to three and hang up at the same time then?” Marinette suggested diplomatically.

 

 _“But how can I trust you to hang up at the same time as me?”_ Adrien asked.

 

"Are you suggesting I'd resort to trickery, Chat Noir?" Marinette gasped in feigned outrage.

 

_“I’ve seen you smile in an akuma’s face while scheming to steal his possessed item, Princess, I know you would.”_

 

...Well Marinette couldn’t very well deny THAT.

 

“Alright then, how about we settle this like me and Mama used to when I was little?” The suggested instead.

 

_“Oh? This sounds interesting. What do you have in mind?”_

 

“A riddle. I’ll ask, and you have three chances to answer it. If you get it right, I’ll hang up first. But if you get it wrong and lose, then you have to hang up instead. Sound fair?”

 

 _“You and your mom tell each other riddles to decide who hangs up first?”_ Adrien asked, incredulous and amused all at once.

 

“Well, no.” Marinette admitted. “It was something we did to pass time, or if I wanted some candy or a new toy or something. Mama would give me a riddle, and if I could answer it in three guesses then I would win.”

 

 _"That's... Actually kind of awesome."_ Adrien admitted, sounding impressed. _"Did you usually win?"_

 

“Not at first, but after a while I got good enough that mom had to stop.”

 

 _“Sounds like I’m at a disadvantage here then.”_ Adrien said with a thoughtful hum.

 

“What’s the matter, superhero? You scared?” Marinette goaded. Adrien might’ve thought that SHE was combative, but she knew for a fact that her partner could never resist the temptation to show off, even if it backfired on him horribly.

 

 _"Oh bring it on!”_ Adrien responded almost instantly. _“I can handle anything you got!”_ Marinette grinned as she rolled her eyes affectionately.

 

Never let it be said that she didn’t know her cat.

 

“When you buy me I am costly, but the only use I have is just hanging only. What am I?”

 

 _“Okay, so something that hangs and is expensive. I can do that.”_ Adrien said confidently. Marinette smiled as she waited for Adrien’s answer. _“Let’s see… a chandelier?”_

 

“Good guess, but no.” Marinette answered. “Chandeliers give light, so you can’t say that their only use is to be hung. Two more guesses, Adrien.”

 

 _“No problem! I still got this!”_ Adrien insisted. _“Okay. Expensive, and only hangs… Expensive and only hangs… What about a painting?”_

 

"Sorry, but you’re wrong again." Marinette hummed. “You can’t really say that paintings have no use beyond hanging on a wall. Otherwise, art museums like the Louvre would go out of business pretty fast.”

 

 _“Okay, so maybe this is harder than I thought…”_ Adrien said, clearly disheartened. _“Can I have another hint? Please? I am an unworthy amateur up against a seasoned pro, after all.”_ Marinette snickered.

 

“I know empty flattery when I hear it, but I’ll let it slide this time.” She said coyly. “It’s something I own.”

 

 _"Okay. Expensive. Hanging. Something you own.”_ Adrien muttered to himself under his breath for a while, making Marinette giggle.

 

“Give up yet?” She asked.

 

 _“Hang on! I’m working on it! Don’t rush me!”_ Adrien replied. _“…uh… Flags?”_

 

“Since when are flags expensive?” Marinette asked, laughing.

 

 _“I don’t know! The only other thing you got hanging on your walls is pictures!”_ Adrien whined. _“Okay, so you win. What’s the answer?”_

 

“Earrings, Kitty. Earrings are expensive, but their only purpose is to be hung from your ears as decoration.”

 

 _"Oh come on! Can't you say the same thing about necklaces?”_ Adrien complained.

 

“Necklaces can have charms, or lockets, or something else that carries a special meaning for the wearer. You don’t get that with earrings.” Marinette replied.

 

 _“I guess,”_ Adrien sighed. _“Does that mean your earrings are expensive then?”_

 

“They’re priceless.” Marinette answered with a secretive smile. Granted, HER earrings did have a purpose beyond being decorative, but she wasn’t about to tell Adrien that over the phone. “And you lose, which means you hang up first.”

 

 _“I know, I know!”_ Adrien groaned before a sly lit entered his voice. _“…but we never agreed on WHEN the loser had to hang up, did we?”_

 

“Adrien!” Marinette tried to scold through her laugh.

 

 _“Yeah, I know.”_ Adrien replied warmly. _“Hey, um… Marinette?”_

 

“Hmmm?” Marinette said, struggling to reign in a yawn.

 

 _“I… I’ll see you at school tomorrow, okay?”_ Marinette frowned curiously at that. It almost sounded like Adrien had meant to say something else, but changed his mind halfway through. She toyed with the idea of calling him out on it, but decided that if it was important, he’d tell her. After all, he’d already bared enough of his soul for one day, and she still hadn’t gotten the chance to reveal her big secret to him.

 

"Yeah. See you then.” Marinette softly returned. “Goodnight, Adrien.”

 

 _“Sleep tight, Marinette.”_ Adrien answered before finally hanging up. Marinette gave a satisfied sigh before ending the call as well, giving the device a dopey grin as she plugged it into the charger.

 

“Love looks good on you, Marinette.” Tikki observed with a giggle. Marinette grinned in reply before falling face first into her pillow.

 

“I still can’t believe he likes me.” She admitted slyly as the Kwami settled next to her.

 

“I can.” Tikki responded with absolute certainty. “You have many admirable traits, Marinette. You’re brave, and resourceful, and kind, and incredibly creative.” Marinette gave the small red goddess a grateful smile before rolling over to stare thoughtfully up at the ceiling.

 

“Do you think he’ll be surprised, when I tell him I’m Ladybug?” She wondered. “I hope he doesn’t get mad at me for not telling him sooner. Especially after he told my parents and everything about him being Chat Noir.” Tikki went still at that, the small smile that curved red lips upward dropping into a worried frown.

 

“…You plan to tell him?” The Kwami said, voice carefully neutral. Marinette blinked at the sudden shift in Tikki’s tone, turning to give her companion her full attention.

 

“Of course.” She said. “It’s only fair, now that I know who he is.”

 

“I disagree.” Tikki sighed with a shake of their head. “You figured out Chat Noir’s identity because he was careless. More careless then he ought to have been. If you tell him that you are Ladybug, then it just means that there’s a greater chance of others learning your identity. There’s nothing fair about that, Marinette.”

 

“So, what, you think I should just string him along then?” Marinette demanded, more than a little offended at the suggestion that Adrien would be incapable of keeping her secret. “He’s my partner, Tikki. And I trust him. He gave up his identity for me, so why shouldn’t I do the same?”

 

“Marinette, you told me once that you believe a good superhero listens to her head, rather than thinking with her heart.” Tikki reminded her firmly. “Which do you think you’re doing now?”

 

"Why can't I do both, then?" Marinette demanded, frustration tinting her tone. “There are plenty of reasons it makes sense to tell Adrien I’m Ladybug, that have nothing to do with the fact that we’re dating now! We’ll be able to coordinate better, to cover for each other during Akuma attack and it’ll be easier to pass along information and cover for one another when there’s a problem! Think of how much easier it would have been to get you back from Chloe if Adrien knew she took you! Or what about Volpina? I almost gave up my earrings for an illusion!”

 

“And yet none of this was an issue for you to get around without Chat Noir knowing your identity.” Tikki shot back. “It’s true that it could have been easier with Adrien’s help, but you still managed to overcome those obstacles without needing to reveal your identity to him. Because you are strong, and capable, and clever.”

 

“Well maybe I don’t want to be that way all the time!” Marinette shouted. “Maybe it’d be nice to have some support! Someone I can talk to without lying, or hating myself because I’m keeping secrets from them! Adrien would never betray me, and Chat Noir would rather die than see me harmed!”

 

“And who’s to say that obsession won’t be his downfall?” Tikki demanded. “It’s happened in the past, with other Chat Noirs.”

 

“Well none of those Chat Noirs were Adrien!” Marinette said defensively.

 

“No, but the Black Cat is always a creature ruled by emotions, and those emotions turn selfish only too often. Which is one of the reasons why Plagg and I insist on the secrecy in the first place, to minimize the danger you face.” Tikki advised, their face softening into a worried, sympathetic look that only made Marinette angrier. “I’m not doubting that Adrien cares for you, Marinette, and that you care for him. But the dangers you face as long as Hawkmoth is still around are very serious, and need to be considered carefully before you do anything hasty.”

 

"How am I being hasty? Chat Noir and I have been working together for nearly a year now!”

 

“Marinette, your secret identity--”

 

“--must NEVER be revealed! No one must know, Marinette! Lie to your parents, and your friends, and your teachers! Let Alya think she’s so unimportant to you that you’d leave her waiting at the movies for two hours while you’re off fighting an Akuma! Disappoint your Mama and Papa by practically destroying your grades, and not helping them when you said you would! Work yourself to the point of exhaustion with being a superhero, and a student, and still trying to keep a social life while you pursue your own dreams! Oh, and don’t forget to deceive your partner, the guy who’d probably walk through fire for you, because saving your own skin is apparently more important than believing in trust and commitment!” Tikki’s eyes widened at her charge’s outburst, but Marinette was far from done.

 

Pain was funny that way. When you spend all your time bottling it up because you feel it’s for the best, or you’re afraid of the consequences of actually saying the words out loud, then it builds and grows into a monster that, once unleashed, is completely out of your control. Marinette knew this, and had fought many Akuma who were at their core just people who had been pushed too far for too long, but the relief of finally getting her frustration out in the open was almost intoxicating.

 

"I never said that, Marinette. But you and Adrien aren’t just normal teenagers in love. You have responsibilities. Duties as heroes of Paris.”

 

“I never asked for any of that!” Marinette reminded the Kwami harshly. “I never asked for a Miraculous, or the responsibilities of having one! Don’t you know how scared I am that I’ll mess it all up? That everyone will figure out that this girl they think is so amazing and strong is just Marinette, who can’t walk two feet without tripping and spent nearly a year looking a boy she fought crime with dead in the eye and never realizing he was the same guy who sat in front of her every day in school?”

 

“Marinette, please--!”

 

“I try so hard to do everything, and it’s still not enough!” Marinette bat at the tears she could feel accumulating in her eyes, taking a deep, shaky breath. “I don’t want to lie to Adrien, and I shouldn’t have to. Why isn’t that enough of a reason for me to tell him who I am? Why can’t I just have one person I can be honest with? Someone who understands what I’m going through? Why are you so against that?”

 

“Because it’s not the romantic notion you seem to think it is, Marinette.” Tikki told her, their voice sharpening with something Marinette didn’t recognize, which sounded a lot like anger. “Because I don’t want to see another one of my chosen’s run through, or burned at the stake, or thrown into the sea to drown! Because I have nightmares too, Marinette, of all the ways I could have lost you! Of the times that your Chat Noir almost took his claws to your face!”

 

“He was possessed! You can’t hold that against him!” Marinette protested.

 

“And I don’t. But as your Kwami, it’s my responsibility to protect you from any threat. Even if it’s your partner.”

 

“Plagg doesn’t seem to have a problem with Adrien revealing himself tow whoever he wants.” Marinette pointed out bitterly.

 

“Plagg believes in encouraging his Chosen’s independence, and letting them muddle through the consequences themselves. It has been a point of contention between us for quite some time.” Tikki informed her tiredly. “You and Adrien carry different burdens, too. He’s obviously starved for affection, and willing to do anything for your approval. Even endanger you and your parents by revealing himself to help gain your acceptance.”

 

"My parents won't tell anyone!"

 

“They don’t have to, Marinette. All it takes is a slip from any of you, and if the wrong person were to see…”

 

“Ugh! I swear, you are so paranoid! You don’t even want me keeping a diary because you’re convinced it’s going to reveal me to the entire world!”

 

“It almost did once.” Tikki reminded her.

 

“I handled that, as you pointed out earlier. And if you’d just trust me enough to let me tell Adrien the truth--!”

 

“This isn’t about trust, Marinette. It’s about avoiding unnecessary risks.”

 

“Unnecessary by who’s standards?” Marinette demanded. “Maybe YOU’RE fine with living a life of lies and secrets, but it’s not exactly something I enjoy!”

 

“I have never lied--!”

 

“Maybe not directly, but you never really give me the truth! You and Master Fu turn everything into puzzles and I’m just the rat running blindly through the maze!” Marinette said hotly. “Well you know what? I’m done with that. I’m telling Adrien the truth next time I see him, and if you have a problem with that then you can take your miraculous and find a new Ladybug, because I’m through with the lies.” And with that declaration, Marinette turned away from the Kwami, pulling her covers up over her head. Tikki frowned, studying her for a moment before flying down to turn off the light and settle on Marinette’s chaise, listening sadly to the girl trying to cry silently in the bed above her, their own pain buried carefully within.

 

Even after thousands of years, this was still one of Tikki’s least favorite parts of being a Kwami, but it was by far preferable to watching helplessly as another child drew their final breath far, far too soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo, can anyone tell that I have an issue with the popular fanon trope of Tikki being fine with an identity reveal while Marinette is 500% deadset against it?
> 
> Watching the show, I always got the impression that Tikki is far, FAR more stressed about the idea of people finding out that Marinette is Ladybug than Marinette is. Even the smallest HINT of a possible risk is enough to freak them out, like in Lady Wifi when Marinette gets a note from Alya about knowing who Ladybug is (in comparison, Marinette is basically 'Nah, Chill. No biggie.) or in Dark Blade when they realize that Marinette is writing about her exploits as Ladybug in a journal. Marinette DOES worry when the threat of a reveal is more tangible, but she doesn't seem nearly as concerned as her Kwami. I've never really seen anyone explore this in regards to Marinette considering revealing herself to Adrien/Chat before, and wanted to try my hand at it here.


	16. In Which Two Steps Forward Are Taken

Alya glares at her homework with enough vicious intensity that the paper seems to shrink away out of sheer terror.  Through the wall she can hear the low arguing of her parents, which occasionally rises to a furious screech before her mother brings her voice back down. Probably to avoid disturbing her sisters.

How considerate of her.

Her phone, charging off on the side of her desk, buzzes.  Alya reaches over and unlocks it, glancing at the screen.

A message from Nino.  She taps the notification and opens it.

“Hey babe,” she reads.  “ur mom looked pretty angry earlier when she came by to pick u up”

She considers giving his commentary the degree of attention it deserves—which, considering that even blind-as-a-bat Nino sans glasses could’ve noticed the expression of barely-controlled rage on her mother’s face from twenty paces, probably merited only a flatly sarcastic “Really.” or “Wow, you think so?”—but refrains.  Nino wasn’t doing anything wrong, and it wasn’t fair of her to vent her spleen at him.

“Yeah, she decided to chew me out over what happened in school today,” she texts back.

“Ovr everyone going after chloe”

“Yeah.”

“U all right”

“Yeah, I’m fine, thanks.  I mean, aside from being grounded for a month.  And suspended.”

“Uh”

After a second, Nino follows up his message with a concisely eloquent “What.”

“Yeah, it turns out that fucking spineless tit Damocles doesn’t like being called a corrupt pig chained to the petty whims of a vain teenaged brat of a girl.”

A few more seconds pass before Nino replies, “You what”.

“I may have lost my temper at him.  Slightly.”

“After the rest of us left huh”

“Yeah.”

“Babe i love u”

“I sense a but coming.”

“But you really really need to cool it with the whole provoking chloe thing”

Alya quashes the shrieking, rising tide of rage and goes intead with a measured, “Nino, I would choose your next words.  Very.  Carefully.”

“Oh for crying out loud just wait a sec”

She waits a second.  Then a minute.

“Well?”

“Look we all get it,” Nino writes.  “We all love mari and we all hate that chloe likes to pick on her and letting that stuff slide makes none of us happy.  But ur the only one of us whose mom actually works for her.  Do u think that shes not going to be petty enough to go after ur fam?”

The entire apartment goes still.  A quiet, high-pitched ringing fills her ears.

“Babe?

Uh babe

Babe u havent said anything

Its been like a minute

Oh fuck

Did ur mom lose her job”

“No,” Alya types in quickly, “no, we’re fine, Nino.”

“Oh good”

“I had not thought of that, damn.”  Alya stops and chews on her upper lip.  “But look, I don’t”

“Look I know u dont want to not do the right thing,” Nino texts before she can finish.  “Uh if you get my point”

“I do, thank you Nino.”

“But u need to take care of urself too

Mari wouldnt want u to ruin ur life for her”

“Look, even /she/ can’t get Mom fired that easily, there are too many ways they’d get screwed over legally.”

“U think she cares abt laws?  Or knows abt them?”

“No, but her father does.”

A pause.  Then, “Point but I still think u should back off a bit.  U dont need to keep going after chloe all the time, we can do tht. Just focus on helping mari.”

Alya stares at the message for a few seconds before tapping in, “Look, can you take a call right now?”

“Sure”

A second later, her phone rings.  She accepts the call and turns on the speakerphone.

“Hey babe,” Nino says.

“Nino, I can’t do that,” Alya says.  “No, let me finish.  Marinette needs someone who’ll always be there to stand up for her, and—I’m trying not to be too judgmental here, but you guys have dropped the ball consistently there.”

“Okay,” Nino says after a moment.  “Harsh, but yeah, I get what you’re saying.”

“So I—can’t, Nino,” Alya says, “I can’t just do that to her.”

“I thought you’d say that,” Nino says with a sigh.  “How long are you going to be out of class?”

“Eight days starting tomorrow,” Alya says.  “So I’ll be back, uh, next next Tuesday, I think.  Yeah, Tuesday.”

“All right,” Nino says.  “I’ll talk to Adrien, see if the four of us can’t hang out at your place sometime this weekend.”

“That is probably not going to work,” Alya says, sticking her tongue out in the direction of the living room.  “Grounded, remember?  I sincerely doubt Mom’d let me have friends over.”

“Yeesh,” Nino says.  “Think that telling her that we’re bringing class notes would work?  We have that test in math the Friday you get back.”

“I think the automatic response to that would be ‘why don’t you just email them to her?’” Alya says, making a face.  “You’re welcome to give it a shot, though.”

“Sometimes I forget how harsh your mom is,” Nino says.  Someone says something in the background, the words indistinct.  Nino responds, “Yeah, give me a sec.”

“You need to go?”

“Chores,” Nino says.

“Wow,” Alya says.  “Bummer.”

“Your mockery is noted and unappreciated,” Nino says with a haughty sniff. “Love you, babe.  Talk to you later.”

“Love you, Nino.”

Alya sets her phone down on her desk with a quiet _click_ as Nino hangs up and slumps back into her chair, letting the noises of her apartment fill her room.

It’s just that the noises are about ninety percent her parents arguing.

“What’s going to happen the next time she decides to do that to an authority figure?” her mother shouts, the words punching easily through the intervening walls.  “She could get _arrested!_  Or shot!”

“And what kind of message do you think we’re sending to her,” her father replies, his basso voice a heated rumble, “to her sisters?  That if someone powerful and influential does something wrong they should just shuffle along and pretend that nothing wrong is going on?”

“There is a _time_ and a _place_ for these things, and _neither_ of them is right in front of the Headmaster, to the Headmaster’s face!”

“Then where?  Then when? When is a good time to point out the obvious injustice of her situation?”

“She goes to the rector, or someone else up the ladder from the Headmaster,” her mother says.  “She uses some _common sense_ and _good judgment_ instead of _rash bullheadedness!_ ”

Alya sighs, heads to her bed, and stuffs her head beneath her pillow, muffling her father’s reply.

At some point, she falls asleep.

* * *

“Morning, Nino,” Marinette says the next morning as he walks in with Adrien at his heels; Adrien slides his torn bag across to Marinette with a wink that makes something flush hotly in her chest.  “M-Morning, Adrien.  Hey,” Marinette says, “did either of you see Alya on your way in?”

“She didn’t tell you?” Nino says, his brows popping up for a moment.  “She decided to yell at Damocles for basically just doing whatever Chloe wants him to do instead of his job.  She got suspended.”

“Uh,” Adrien says.

“She what?” Marinette says.

“She, uh, basically called Damocles a sock puppet with Chloe’s Dad’s hand up his ass,” Nino says.

“To his face,” Marinette says.

“A-yup.”

Marinette swears under her breath as Adrien asks, “How long is she suspended for?”

“Two weeks,” Nino says.

“Wait, what?” Alix says.  She reaches up and pops out an earbud.  The sound of someone screeching loudly in Russian while an electric guitar howls in the background rings tinnily from it before she reaches down and pauses her music. “Chloe got Alya suspended?”

“This is going to get repetitive,” Nino mutters under his breath. “All right, so Alya got in a shouting match with Damocles, said some things she shouldn’t have, Damocles gave her a two-week suspension.  I don’t know if Chloe actually, y’know, told him to punish her or if she egged her on, but that’s all I know.”

“Aw, jeez,” Alix says, rolling her eyes and slumping back into her chair. “Your girlfriend is an idiot, Nino.”

“Sometimes,” Nino says.

They hear a haughty sniff from the door way and a rapid clat-clatter of heels on the floor.  Half a dozen heads—Adrien’s, Alix’s, Marinette’s, Nino’s, Kim’s, and Lila’s—turn towards Chloe as she struts to her seat, followed closely by Sabrina.

“Only a shame she couldn’t get expelled,” she says as she sits.  “But I’m sure she’ll slip up at some point.”

“We can only hope,” Alix says, attempting to make Chloe spontaneously combust with sheer force of will.

“Why, thank you—“

“I don’t think she was talking about you, Chloe,” Lila says.

“No,” Alix confirms, “I wasn’t.  Thank you for the clarification.  Some people needed it, apparently.”  She waves to Mylene and Ivan as they shuffle into class as well and puts her feet up on the desk and her hands behind her head.

“Excuse me?” Chloe says, bristling.

Alix takes a deep, satisfied breath.  “For the benefit of the idiot in the room,” she says, “I’ll repeat myself. One of these days, you’re going to let your gigantic ego get the better of you, and you’re going to do something so monumentally stupid even by your standards that even dear old daddy isn’t going to be able to cover for you, and all of us are going to be rid of your burden.”

Nino sighs and turns on his music, bringing up the volume until the sounds of Alix, Mylene, and Chloe screaming at each other are mostly drowned out.  Adrien slouches beside him and looks miserable. Marinette takes out her sketchbook and starts to scribble as the others file in.

“Uh, excuse me,” Rose asks Nino as she and Juleka come in a few minutes later. Nino pries his headphones loose and cocks an ear towards her.  “Where’s Al—“

“Later,” Nino groans, “please.”

* * *

Juleka approaches him later as everyone is queuing up to leave for lunch.

“Alya’s been suspended because she mouthed off to Damocles,” Nino says, “she’ll be back in a couple weeks.”

Juleka blinks at him.  “Uh,” she says.  “Yeah. I know.  Rose told me.”

“Oh thank god,” Nino says.  “You would not believe how many times I’ve needed to repeat myself today.”

“Fourteen times,” Juleka says.  “Max’s been keeping score.  Kim has a small betting pool going as to when you’ll crack.”

“He what?”

“He’s set up a betting pool as to how many times people will need to ask you where Alya is before you snap,” Juleka says.

“How much is in the pot?” Nino asks.

“Around twenty euros,” Juleka says.

“Who’s winning right now?”

“Rose and I,” Juleka says.  “We’ve put five euros in on you snapping at seventeen asks.”

Nino blinks at her, then lets his head sink into his hands.  “You guys suck,” he says, voice muffled.

“Love you too.  Anyways, what I was _going_ to ask was whether you knew what was going on with Adrien and Marinette.”

Nino looks up, bemused.  “What do you mean ‘what’s going on’?”

“Rose says that they’ve been a lot touchier than usual,” Juleka says. “They seem a lot closer than they were yesterday,” she translates after a look at Nino’s expression.

Nino thinks it over, his intuition throwing sparks onto tinder at the back of his mind.

“Maybe something’s happened,” he says with a shrug.  “Tell you the truth, I hadn’t noticed anything really different.”

“Too worried about Alya?”

“Too worried about Chloe deciding to do something involving Alya,” Nino says.  “She’s not exactly a kind, wonderful, forgiving, charitable sort of person.”

Juleka makes a face.  “Don’t need to tell me twice,” she says.  She glances up at Rose, waiting patiently for her at the sidewalk.  “Look, I gotta go.  See you later?”

“Later.”

Nino watches the two of them go, absorbed in thought until Adrien’s hand lands lightly on his shoulder.

“Huh?  Oh, hey,” Nino says.

“Heading home for lunch?” Adrien asks, sitting next to him on the school’s front steps.

“Duh,” Nino says.

“Want a ride?  The Gorilla should be here in a few.”

“Sure,” Nino says.

His mind flits back to what Juleka had said.  Adrien had been closer to Marinette, had he?  Well, he had offered her his help in snagging him way back when, and it wasn’t like it’d hurt to give him just a little nudge. And they didn’t have anything else to do.

“Hey, is everything all right with Mari?” Nino asks, giving Adrien a sidelong glance.  “She seemed really shaken up the other day.”

“Hm?  Oh, yeah,” Adrien says.  “She looked a lot better when I left.  You and Alya went to visit after school, right?”

“Yeah,” Nino says.  “Seemed a little tense, but at least she wasn’t actually freaking out.”

“That’s good,” Adrien says.

Nino leans back onto his elbows.  “Hey,” he says, “do you know why she had all those band-aids on her fingers?”

“Oh, burned herself on a hot pan,” Adrien says, then hastily adds, “that’s my best guess at any rate.  She does a lot of baking, doesn’t she?”

“Probably,” Nino says.  “Someone’ll need to help her with stuff.”

“Probably,” Adrien echoes.  “Real question is, will she _let_ herself be helped.”

“Pride goeth,” Nino says.

“Hey, at least one of us will be there to catch her if she trips, right?” Adrien says.  He shoots Nino a sunny, wolfish smile.  “What are friends for, anyways?”

Nino mirrors his smile and offers up his fist.  Adrien taps his knuckles to his as a car pulls up to the curb.  “Come on,” Adrien says.  “Let’s go.”

* * *

“Hey, is your hand doing better?” Adrien asks Marinette.  “Your blisters are healing well?”

“Yes, they are,” Marinette says with a patient sigh and a small smile.  “Please stop fussing, I’m not an invalid, Adrien.”

Rose coos at them while Chloe glowers, fuming so ferociously that for a second Nino is forcibly reminded of Mt. Etna, looming over the innocent and unaware citizens of Catania, ready to obliterate them and their little lives in a moment’s notice.

Nino lets his attention drift to more important matters once he’s satisfied that Chloe isn’t going to explode and try to claw someone’s eyes out.  At least in the immediate future.

Marinette and Adrien had been, well, the only word that really fit was odd, over the past week.

Adrien had been fairly normal, aside from the aggressively keen interest he’d started showing in Marinette—Nino lets himself preen a little at that, go him.  Just one week and Adrien was already well on the way to asking her out, Alya was going to freak.  But their every interaction had been tempered with a sense of coiled restraint on Adrien’s part, like he’d desperately wanted to do something or to say something but had felt that the time or the place or the company wasn’t quite right.  Although Chloe’s constant, hovering presence all three were more or less the case.

And, well, Marinette.  She should’ve been over the moon with Adrien’s constant, focused attention, Nino was sure.  He knew that he wasn’t exactly a master at reading people but Marinette could be counted on to be as ecstatic as Chloe was incensed whenever Adrien paid her the least bit of attention.

Or, she had been, at least.  Now she was distant and distracted half the time; but why?  It probably wasn’t anything Chloe had done, every other time this week she’d made an attempt to crack Marinette’s composure they’d put a stop to it before things could get, ahem, _messy_.  Maybe the aftereffects of Chloe’s dumb trick with the honey?  But she’d seemed practically normal just a couple days after that.  Maybe she was just worried for Alya?  That felt a lot more likely, but his gut was still telling him that there was something off about that guess.

Nino grumbles under his breath.  He needs Alya for this.  Well, a couple more days and she’ll be back, and then maybe they’d be able to figure this mess out.

But first, of course, he needs to pass this dumb exam, or his parents would have his head.  He turns his thoughts away from his friends’ relationship drama and back towards the mass of incomprehensible squiggles on the board.

* * *

“I—“

_Thunk._

“—hate—“

_Thunk_.

“—this.”

_Thunk_.

“I’m pretty sure that concussing yourself isn’t going to help, Nino,” Adrien says from where he lounges on Marinette’s floor.  Marinette lobs a croissant at his head; Adrien catches it, shoots a wink back her way, and bites off one of the horns.

“Not all of us have fancy math tutors to help us, Mr. ‘I’m already learning calculus’,” Nino mutters darkly.  He catches the pain au chocolat that Marinette throws to him and starts chewing steadily through it, not bothering to brush away the crumbs that fall into the spine of his open math textbook.  “Seriously, this is all Greek to me.”

“You did pretty well on the homework for this section, didn’t you?” Marinette says.  She takes the last pastry, a cheese danish, from the plate on her desk, folds it in half, and takes a bite.

“I thought I did,” Nino says.  “But since I don’t get a single thing this book is saying, I’m having second thoughts about that.”

“In fairness, this isn’t the best resource in the first place,” Adrien says, “according to my tutor anyways.  Frankly I think he just has a personal vendetta against the author or the publisher or something.”

“Well, it is an American publishing house,” Marinette says, flipping through page after page of arcane scrawl with a glazed, disinterested air. “Think that has something to do with it?”

“Maybe,” Adrien says.

“Oh, yeah, do you mind if I drop by and use your scanner later, Adrien?” Nino says.

“Mm?  Yeah, sure, why?”

“Alya’s still under house arrest, remember?” Nino says.  “She’s going to need our notes.”

Adrien pauses in the middle of copying out an equation, shakes his head with a slight frown, and continues.  “Shoot, can’t believe I forgot that.  Think her mom will let her Skype in?”

“Probably,” Nino says.

“I’ll text her and see if she’s open,” Marinette says, pulling out her phone and tapping a quick message.

“I’ll pop down and return the plate,” Adrien says.

Nino groans and rolls onto his back as Adrien hauls open the trapdoor and trots downstairs, sitting up and stretching out his back and neck with a succession of loud pops.

“Seriously, how the heck does Adrien remember all this stuff?” Marinette grumbles, opening a drawer and taking out a sheet of lined paper.  “I’ve been staring at this for half an hour and I still can’t remember all the identities.”

“Fancy expensive math tutor, remember?” Nino says.

“Ah.  Right.”

Nino stares at her back as Marinette starts scribbling, slowly and carefully, her gaze darting back and forth between the text and her notes.

“On the subject of Adrien,” he says carefully.  “Is it just me, or has he been paying a lot more attention to you recently?”

Marinette pauses for a second, then erases a line from her notes. “That’s possible,” she says.

“You’re taking this calmly.”

“You were expecting something else?”

“Yes,” Nino says.  “More flailing, freaking out, panicking, that sort of thing.”

Marinette turns around in her chair and raises an eyebrow at him. “Excuse me?”

“Just saying,” Nino says, “you have, in general, tended to freak whenever Adrien was involved.”

“I have not,” Marinette says, with a coloring of mild indignation to her words.

“Marinette, even Adrien was picking up on how weird you were acting around him,” Nino says.

Marinette frowns slightly.  “What do you mean?”

“I mean, like, before all this stupid crap with Chloe and stuff, back when you first met him,” Nino says.  “The flailing, the random squealing, the whole ‘hiding behind the nearest solid object or Alya whenever he’s around’ thing.”

Marinette blinks, a slow blush burning down from her ears into her cheeks and upwards from her shoulders.  After a minute, she looks down and mumbles, “Well, things have changed.”

“Dude,” Nino says.  “You’ve had him fawning over you for an entire week and you’ve kept your cool the entire time?  I’d say ‘things have changed’ is the understatement of the year.”

“No kidding,” Marinette says with a little laugh.

“Hey,” Adrien says, popping his head up through the trapdoor, making them both jump.  “Hey, Nino, you free for dinner?  Marinette’s parents want to know.”

“Uh, probably not,” Nino says.

“All right.”  Adrien shuts the trapdoor behind him and tromps down the stairs.

“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about this while Adrien’s around,” Marinette says.

“Yeah,” Nino says.

* * *

Marinette stands and stretches, wincing at the sharp-dull, sharp-dull aching pulse in her back, and brushes a sweat-damp lock of her hair back behind an ear.

She really ought to thank her dad after this.  She’d almost forgotten how much ass cleaning out the ovens sucked.

But hey, on the bright side making sure that the ovens were sparkling now meant less labor for the rest of the month.  Theoretically.

She just wishes that it felt like a plus, instead of like a herniated disc.

Well, punishment wasn’t supposed to be an all-expenses paid vacation, and it wasn’t as though she didn’t kinda sorta deserve it for going behind her parents’ back like that.

She was going to be grounded for _so long_ when they found out about the Ladybug thing.

Her thoughts inexorably shift to Tikki, currently sulking nearby atop one of the counters.

A week had not changed the little spirit’s mind on the whole “tell my boyfriend, who is Chat Noir, that I am Ladybug, who also happens to have been the girl he has pined after for literally his entire career, which granted is only a few months at this point but will definitely help clear up any issues in the future and make our dating life much less awkward in the long run”, or made them more talkative on the subject.  Not a peep, not a word, not a single damn hint as to why they were so reluctant to let her tell him.

Frustrating in the extreme.

And what makes it worse, she reflects as she starts scrubbing the next oven, is that the kwami wouldn’t be so insistent if they didn’t have a very, very good reason.

She crawls inside the oven, wriggling flat on her back to fit, and bangs her head on something when she hears a sudden sharp rapping on the bakery’s front door.

“Ow,” she growls as she shimmies her way back out, rubbing the spot—that was going to leave a bruise.  Who the hell would come by at this hour?  Well, burglars, maybe, but they’d just try to smash in one of the windows, they wouldn’t knock.

_Rap rap rap rap._

“All right, all right, I’m coming, what the hell do you—“

Adrien—Chat Noir, she corrects herself mentally—is standing on her front step.

She goggles at him for a moment as he waves cheerily.

“What the hell are you doing here this late,” Marinette hisses at him as she unlocks the door.  “Keep it down, we’re dead meat if Mama and Papa hear us.”

“Well, I had some time before my evening patrol,” Chat purrs as Marinette unlocks the security gate and pulls it open as quietly as she can.  “And I figured that I’d stop by to see my favorite—“

“Knock it off, Adrien,” Marinette says, “I’m serious, you’re not even supposed to be here unless it’s to help me study!  At least for another few weeks.”

Chat reaches behind him and pulls out a folded sheet of paper from his belt.  “I figured you might need this,” he says innocently.  “You know, for the test.”

Marinette stares blankly at it, then at his all-too-innocently-sunny expression.

Oh, fuck it.  She’d missed this.

“Come in,” she says resignedly, taking the paper from him and stuffing it into a pocket.  She pulls the security gate across and locks it again as Chat skips in, humming a little tune under his breath.

He engulfs her in a hug from behind, gently resting his chin on her shoulder.  Marinette jumps in surprise, nearly headbutting him as she instinctively jerks backwards, her heel twitching upwards in an entirely reflexive movement. Then she relaxes and sinks into the embrace.  Her hands move to rest languidly over his arms.

“I missed you,” he says.

Marinette snorts.  “You were here like, two hours ago.  And we’ll see each other tomorrow anyways.”

“I still missed you,” he says.  “And I missed this.  Being able to just be alone with you.”

“You are so needy,” she says, reaching up to scratch him behind an ear; he purrs and leans into her touch.  “And don’t pout at me like that.”

“You can’t even see my face,” he says.

“I can see your reflection in the glass, kitty,” Marinette says.  She pushes at his arms around her waist until he releases her, with many whines of protest.  “And don’t bother with the kitty eyes either.”

Chat turns the kitty eyes up to eleven as Marinette turns to face him with a small smile flitting about the edges of her composure, then up to twelve as she shows no sign of budging.

“I give,” he says after a minute.

“Hah!”  Marinette raises both fists in the air, walking a mock victory lap around Chat as he claps.  “Do I win anything, oh boyfriend-of-mine?”

The expression on his face drains, to be replaced by nervous wariness.

“Uh, Chat?  What’s wrong?”

“Uh,” he says after a moment.  “That’s actually what I came here about, we never really got a chance to make it official, remember?”

“What?  Oh.”

Marinette, despite herself, flushes and looks down at her feet.

“You, uh,” Chat says, “um, ever done this before?”

“No,” Marinette says quickly, glancing up.  “No, you’d be my first.  I mean, if you want to be.”

“Oh, good,” he says.

The two stand a little bit apart from each other, staring at each other’s shoes, neither daring to make the first move.  Marinette almost laughs; they must’ve looked ridiculous, the two of them, standing there all bashful and coy and whatever.

And then, with that thought, her nervousness vanishes.

He was as nervous as she was.  Him. Perfect boy, whom she’d pined after for so long, was nervous, and she, little plain ol’ her, was the cause.  The sudden tide of light-headed relief almost makes her laugh.  She was standing here all sweaty and dirty and in her rumpled, baggy work clothes and Mr. Swoony Teenage Supermodel was the one looking for escape routes.

“You are such a dork,” Marinette says.

And then she stretches up on tiptoe and kisses him, lightly and chastely, on the lips.

Chat freezes as she leans into him, her hands on his shoulders, her eyes sliding shut, the corners of her mouth turning up in a small smile as she feels the warmth and the life and the trembling, breath-stealing fear in him as it drains away, to be replaced with the absolute reality of the moment and the unquestionable, unassailable truth of _them_ , here and now, together.

He leans into the kiss, slowly, without passion, but with a growing and absolute surety in two unspoken things.

She’s his.

He’s hers.

After a timeless, breathless little eternity, Marinette pulls away and settles back onto her heels.  Her small smile grows wider as she sees the look on his face.

“Chat got your tongue?” she says.

Chat blinks and refocuses.  “I’m supposed to be the one with the terrible lines,” he says, reaching out to cup her cheek in one hand.  His ears twitch as Marinette leans into his touch, and he could swear that he hears the rapid thudding beat of her—or was it his?—heart as they hold each other’s gaze.

“So, uh,” Chat says after a long while.  He drops his hands to his sides.  “Do you need help with those?”

“Huh?”  Marinette blinks at him as she shifts mental gears.

“The ovens,” he says.

“Oh,” she says.  “Nah, I’m good.  I should be done in another ten, fifteen minutes.”

“It’d go faster if I helped.”

“It’s not big enough to fit both of us at the same time,” Marinette says, prodding him gently towards the front door.  “Besides, Mama and Papa would freak out if they saw you here.”

“I’m not entirely sure your parents are capable of that,” Chat says as she unlocks the gate.  “I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“See you tomorrow,” Marinette says.  She stretches up on tiptoe again and pecks him on the nose.  “Night.”

Chat takes her hand and presses a kiss to the back.  “Good evening, Princess,” he says.

Then he vanishes into the night.

Marinette locks up the bakery again and finishes cleaning the oven, then traipses upstairs, humming happily.

“Finished, dear?” Sabine asks as Marinette starts up the stairs to her room.

“Yes, Mama.”

“Good,” Sabine says.  “Don’t stay up too late, dear.”

“Or be entertaining any boys,” she calls as an afterthought.

“I promise, Mama,” Marinette says.

Marinette goes to her room, shuts the trapdoor, and is halfway through pulling her sleep clothes from her closet when she notices the phone on her rug.

“Huh.”

She glances over to where her own phone is charging on her desk, then back at the phone on her rug, then walks over and picks it up, turning it over in her hands.

Nino’s.  He must’ve dropped it during their study session.

She turns on the screen: four missed calls from a number labeled as “Home”. The calls must’ve come in when she was downstairs in the bakery.

Marinette shrugs and places the phone next to hers.  She can just give to him tomorrow, no big deal.

Marinette leaves and takes her shower, then, still floating along on cloud nine, curls up in her bed under her blankets, and falls asleep smiling.

* * *

Nino sprints down the sidewalk, legs churning, his every breath a knife in his chest.

Forget his phone, forget getting it back, forget all of that, there were more important things to worry about at the moment.  He needs to get back home, he needs to get to his computer, he needs to message Alya pronto, he needs to tell _someone_.

_Holy._

_Fuck._

Adrien was going to flip.


End file.
